On October 12, the FISD school board announced the proposed plans for rezoning, affecting many communities. 

The overall increase in enrollment from the previous year contributed to higher student populations at particular schools, including Reedy High School and Lone Star High School. We also welcomed the largest kindergarten class, with more than 4,000 students enrolled. The higher student populations have led to concerns among the FISD school board, as capacity at all FISD high school compasses is 2,100, but Reedy and Lone Star currently have more than 2,200 students on campus. Furthermore, the FISD school board also had to make Newman Elementary closed to new students in its attendance zone this year because of fear of having Newman reach its maximum capacity. 

Next fall, FISD plans to open Panther Creek High School and Minett Elementary to help relieve the high population densities of these schools. The opening of new schools and the desperation to balance out school populations have led to new rezoning plans that have caused a wave of fear in many families. 

The primary complaints against the rezoning regard the high schools, in particular. The rezoning has led to petitions and upcoming protests. To access the petition for communities southwest of Lebanon and Teel, you can use this link: https://chng.it/tYD5FkqGyV. Furthermore, to access the petition for Stonewater Crossing, you can use this link: https://chng.it/kgpKpX6Xsf. 

Mann Bellani, the creator of Stonewater Crossing’s petition, declined to speak about the protest at first. However, on October 18, he reached out to say, “I just want to say that we are a very tiny community with only 70 or so students, and it does not make sense that they are rezoning us and breaking off all of our social connections, as well.” I was also able to get much information on the Reedy Rezone Protest. 

Reedy Rezone Protest (Communities SW of Lebanon and Teel)

On Saturday, October 23, families plan to meet at Hosp Elementary at 9 am and march to Reedy High School, holding signs and banners and dressed in blue and green (Reedy’s colors). Biking to Reedy is also welcome if you prefer to bike than walk. Families also plan to attend the FISD board meeting at 5 pm on October 25 at 5515 Ohio Drive to provide their input on the rezoning and use social media as an asset. 

Why are they doing all of this? Well, one of the main reasons is distance. Because of the rezoning, students living southwest of Lebanon and Teel have to pass much closer high schools, like Reedy, which they were supposed to go to, to get to Frisco High School. 

FISD parents living in communities southwest of Lebanon and Teel have stated the following. 

The school board is completely violating its promise of a small school system where more students can participate in extracurricular activities. Travel times from far southwest Frisco causes students to pass two high schools, Reedy and Wakeland, to get to Frisco HS. The Frisco ISD promise has been smaller schools closer to home to build communities and neighborhoods and provide access to extracurricular activities. It is at least a 20 minute drive-time to Frisco HS, involving some of the worst traffic at the tollway and then a carpool line at least 15-20 minutes in length.

This proposal makes no sense from a geographical distance, as it is 5.5 miles vs. 2.5 miles away for us.

In our neighborhood, many kids bike to school. But with the new boundaries, it will be much too far to do that because they have to cross the tollway.

Separating alleys will not affect the quality of life of our students, but spending 30 minutes on the road every morning and evening will affect their lives. Every decision the ISD takes must be student-centric.

Parents have also brought up the Equal Educational Opportunities Act, which “declares it to be the policy of the United States that all children enrolled in public schools are entitled to equal educational opportunity without regard to race, color, sex, or national origin; and that the neighborhood is the appropriate basis for determining public school assignments.” As Jessica Massengale Hewitt stated, “people have challenged the act before, causing the revelation that that “neighborhood” literally means the closest school geographically.” Therefore, the current rezoning plans are violating the act.

Furthermore, many parents are concerned about the communities students have found at Reedy High School. The possibility of rezoning separating students from their friends has concerned most, if not all. Not to go all “the power of friendship,” but we live in a small city. The foremost reason why students like this city are probably the people they met here. And next year, many students might have to deal with being transferred from a school of friends to a school of strangers in one of the most significant times of their lives. A massive rezoning will be even more stressful for upcoming sophomores, who have already adjusted to their high schools and created relationships with the teachers they expected to have again later during their four years! Because of this, many students have felt that incoming sophomores should not be a part of the rezoning plans.

If the board finalizes the current rezoning plans, many students will also have much longer commute times and less access to extracurricular activities. They will have less time to take care of their mental health because they will be busy doing work or going through the heavy traffic for about an hour. Therefore, parents involved in the Reedy Rezone Protest have raised some other ideas by posting the following:

They need to lower the numbers at Reedy High School to keep it 5A for UIL standards. We all understand this. They needed to add numbers to Wakeland, so what seems to make the most sense would be to take from the northern border of Reedy (who needs to remove students) and add to Wakeland just above it (who needs to add students). However, instead, they took students from Frisco HS and added them to Wakeland, and then took students from Reedy and added them to Frisco HS.

Hi! I understand rezoning happens. We have been rezoned before and while annoying, it made sense. However, moving students from Frisco HS north to Wakeland and then sliding the most southwestern Reedy HS students east to Frisco doesn’t make as much sense to me as just leaving Frisco alone and moving the northeastern part of Reedy to Wakeland. I can’t imagine a company as experienced and reputable as PASA didn’t have an option along these lines. Based upon their website they state “PASA can collaborate with boundary committees and/or District Administration to develop maps and projections for multiple attendance zone options. Considering multiple options shows the public and the Board of Trustees the many factors involved in realigning attendance zones, as well as the benefits and challenges that were weighed in making a final recommendation.”

According to them, while some Reedy High School students would still be affected by these ideas, fewer students would be hurt, especially in terms of distance.

The current rezoning situation is quite messy, but I hope for the best! Stay safe, and thank you for reading!