LOUISVILLE, Ky. — For the first time in almost forty years, Jefferson County Public Schools, the state’s largest school district, has a new school choice plan.
School district leaders voted unanimously to approve the plan Tuesday. Parents and students can choose where they want to attend school. The plan also keeps kids closer to their homes. JCPS held a series of public forums over the last several months to get input on what the community and parents thought of the plan.
Dr. Marty Pollio, JCPS superintendent, said in a news release, “This is a historic vote and a historic day for the children of Jefferson County. Students and families and, in particular, those who live in West Louisville have waited far too long for these changes that will have a dramatic impact on students’ sense of belonging, participation in school and extracurricular activities and, in turn, their academic achievement.”
In the past, Pollio has said the current student assignment plan isn’t fair because it has students who live in and around West Louisville to go to schools in other parts of the county. The new plan allows students living in what JCPS calls the Choice Zone (West Louisville) the option of going to a school closer to home or continue attending schools in other areas of Jefferson County.
Raoul Cunningham, Louisville’s NAACP president, was at the JCPS meeting and said, “The Louisville branch NAACP and the coalition support the new plan subject to the following conditions. The commitments and the plan to the community must be implemented. JCPS must strengthen its accountability process. JCPS accepts that it has a major trust problem which must be worked on daily. “
JCPS says the new school choice plan improves access and opportunities to programs and resources. It makes choosing schools easier for families and ensures magnet schools and programs are “representative of the district’s diversity.”
In a news release about the vote, the district says the plan will add additional $12 million per year for the next decade in increased funding for West Louisville schools and creates whole school magnets at Hawthorne, Coleridge-Taylor and Foster Elementary Schools, Western Middle School for the Arts, the Academy@Shawnee Middle School and Western High School. It also calls for smaller class sizes for schools in the Choice Zone.
You can find the School Choice Plan on the JCPS website and video of the June 1, 2022 Board of Education meeting when the plan was approved on the board’s YouTube Channel.
The new plan will take effect in the 2023-2024 school year.