MOORPARK : Parents to Present School Complaints

A group of Moorpark parents who are disgruntled over school hours and busing plan to voice their complaints at a meeting with two local school board members.

The group, called Parents for Better Schools, expects about 30 people to attend the Jan. 29 meeting, organizer Helen Taylor said. Two members of the board of the Moorpark Unified School District, Tom Baldwin and Gregory J. Barker, have been invited to attend, she said.

The meeting will focus on the group’s desire to end busing in favor of neighborhood schools and to have the district’s elementary and middle schools start at the same time each morning, Taylor said.

The district spends about $500,000 annually on busing, she said, and the vehicles increase traffic congestion and safety problems around schools during peak hours.

The district buses students partly to achieve an enrollment at each school that roughly mirrors the 3-to-1 ratio of Anglos to Latinos in Moorpark’s general population. Another result of the effort toward racial balance is that the district has separate schools for younger and older elementary students, forcing all students to change schools in either third or fourth grade.

“It’s hard on these children” to have to change schools midway through their elementary years, Taylor said.

A separate goal of Taylor’s group is to have all elementary and middle schools start at the same hour. There is presently a half-hour difference between the starting times for some schools. Some parents who have children at more than one school have to make two trips when dropping them off in the mornings, Taylor said.

Parents interested in attending the Jan. 29 meeting can call Taylor at 529-1494.