School Panel Looks at Expansion Options

Still trying to pare class sizes while keeping up with increasing enrollment, the Ventura Unified School District’s long-range planning committee has resolved that the need for new campuses in the city’s east and west ends is clear.

With west-end elementary schools such as Sheridan, E.P. Foster, Lincoln and Pierpont almost at capacity, the committee is looking into reopening the 1920s-era Avenue School and building an elementary school on the ball field at De Anza Middle School.

One east-end site that looks particularly good to the committee, which met Thursday, is a 20-acre plot on the east end south of the 126 Freeway. A new school on the district-owned land bordered by Darling Road and Albany Avenue could help absorb the east end’s increase in student enrollment, committee members said.

Other topics discussed by the committee included the feasibility of combining smaller-sized elementary schools.