CHARLOTTE, N.C.-- Charlotte-Mecklenburg school parents have one more chance to tell school board members how they feel about reassignment plans covering south Charlotte schools at a forum Monday night.
Those plans include closing E.E. Waddell High School, an underfilled and historically low-performing school on Nations Ford Road in southwest Charlotte.
The plan has drawn protests from Waddell students, teachers, and parents who say the school has improved drastically in the last few years and is finally making the progress CMS has been waiting for.
I didn't want my child to come here originally, admitted PTSA President Veronie Gamble.
She petitioned to have her oldest daughter moved to another school, but instead the school board challenged her to make Waddell better.
What she discovered at Waddell surprised her -- in a good way. Once I got here and saw for myself that the teachers really care, there's no reason any child should fail.
Student Government Vice-President Antoinette Cashwell, a senior, echoes Gamble's confidence. I never felt unsafe here, said Cashwell about the school's former reputation as one with gangs. I always felt this is one of the safest places, other than my home.
The Charlotte-Mecklenburg School Board will decide Waddell's fate in November, but parents whose children are zoned to the school are already advocating for where their children will go next.
We'd like to see CMS follow through on their plan for neighborhood schools, said Madison Park parent Lisa Charde.
Her preschooler is still years away from high school, but she'd like to see her neighbors go to the closest schools they can -- Myers Park or South Mecklenburg High Schools.
She bristles at the thought that CMS wants to send Madison Park children to Harding High School, which is close to 10 miles away on the other side of uptown.
We're closest to Myers Park High School -- it's two miles away or less, said Charde, or South Meck, which is five or four miles away. So we'd like to see some of those options. Charde said Madison Park parents aren't taking a position on the closing of Waddell until they better know their options.
Nearby Montclaire neighborhood, just south of Madison Park, is using its Facebook page to drum up support for sending its neighborhood children to South Meck or Myers Park also.
That makes parents like Veronie Gamble wonder why, when those children could be making Waddell a bigger, better school.
Once you get that stability set, said Gamble, you don't do anything but go up and that's what's happening.
The last scheduled forum for parents is Monday night at South Mecklenburg High School on Park Road, from 6 to 8 pm. The following schools will be discussed:
E. E. Waddell High
Smith Language Academy
Quail Hollow Middle
Huntingtowne Farms
Pinewood Elementary
Sedgefield Elementary
Sedgefield Middle
Park Road
Community House
South Mecklenburg
Harding High
Philip O. Berry
Olympic Community of Schools
CMS also plans one addition meeting Tuesday at the Government Center, for parents who didn't get to speak at the October 12th meeting.
