The Hoover City Schools has been trying for more than two years to come up with a rezoning plan that addresses growth and changing demographics while also passing muster with federal authorities. The school board approved the plan Monday night and hopes it makes the grade.
Approval by the Hoover school board sends this proposal for rezoning on to the next level – the federal courts. School officials say the plan already has received nods from the Department of Justice and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. Hoover schools have to clear these hurdles because they’re still under a desegregation court order.
During the Monday school board meeting, Hoover Superintendent Dr. Kathy Murphy explained: “I realize that this plan does not meet the satisfaction of all in our community, and I do regret that there is no perfect plan.”
About a dozen speakers took to the mic to oppose the plan, including Highland Crest neighborhood parent Trent Cowsert.
“I am concerned that the Simmons Middle School and those feeder elementary schools in the central part of town are being disparately impacted by the number of poverty students that are going into those schools,” Cowsert says.
He says he fears test scores will be negatively impacted by the large number of students in poverty assigned to his kids’ schools — Simmons Middle and Gwin Elementary.
Cowsert says most minority students are being pushed toward central Hoover while white students remain primarily in the wealthier east and west.
“It’s almost like segregation instead of desegregation,” says Cowsert. “It does not seem to flow with the spirit of the original desegregation case.”
Murphy, however, says all of those issues were taken into consideration.
“We studied demographics of this school district. We looked at free and reduced lunch students. We looked at special needs students,” Murphy says. “So this has been no simple task with lots of moving parts and pieces.”
The plan now goes to a federal judge for approval, School officials want to the rezoning in place for the start of the next school year.