BREA : School Conversion Called Unfeasible

Converting Brea Junior High School into a middle school is not feasible at this time because of the high cost of remodeling and building new classrooms, a subcommittee of the Brea-Olinda Board of Education has decided.

Adopting a year-round schedule to solve overcrowding in district schools should be implemented only as a last resort, the panel also concluded.

The so-called future growth subcommittee consisted of school board members Lynn Daucher, Susie Sokol and Leonard MacCain, who submitted the recommendations last week. The board has delayed action until April.

Board President Barbara Paxton said the panel was told to focus on managing growth for the next 10 to 15 years, in addition to considering a citizen panel’s report on the middle school and year-round issues.

The panel said that to operate viable elementary schools, enrollment at each school must range from 400 to 650 students, except for Olinda Elementary School, which should have at least 200 students.

To adjust school size, staff will study magnet schools, control of transfers and possible school boundary changes.

Paxton said a boundary committee that will include school administrators, teachers, parents and community leaders will be formed to offer recommendations.

Boundary changes are a sensitive topic, Paxton said, noting that it was an issue in the last board election and parents are often upset if children must be moved to a different school.

“Boundary changes are dynamite,” MacCain said. “They should be approached carefully. . . .” If school borders are redrawn, he said, it must be for the long term, so that students are not constantly reassigned from one school to another.

The committee also recommended that two new elementary schools be built in the next 10 to 15 years, both of them east of the Orange Freeway, to accommodate housing developments such as Olinda Heights and future tracts at Tonner Canyon.

At that time, the committee said, the board could decide to build a middle school and convert Brea Junior High into a second middle school.