Revamped schools drawing interest

Families apparently aren't rebelling against the money-saving school closure/consolidation plan the Charlotte-Mecklenburg school board approved late last year. If they were of a mind to opt out of the new K-8 campuses or the revamped Harding high school, it might easily show up as a surge in magnet school lottery requests.

But at their weekly press briefing, Superintendent Peter Gorman and his aides said they don't see any sign of higher-than-normal magnet school applications from children bound for the revamped schools. They said, for instance, that they saw no evidence fifth-graders zoned for K-8 campuses are applying in higher-than-normal numbers for middle-school magnet programs. Harding, a previously all-magnet school that will accept Waddell's students next fall, also showed strong enrollment numbers. Harding's International Baccalaureate magnet drew 714 students, nearly as many as it had last year.

Of course, pessimists could argue that many parents might not have seen magnets as a practical option, now that CMS requires them in many instances to ferry their kids to less-than-convenient shuttle stops to catch magnet buses. CMS officials prefer the non-pessimist view. "The response of the community has been positive to the changes we've made," said Mike Raible, facility planning guru for CMS.

For more details on the issue, see Ann's story from last week, which also includes a link to a CMS page with all lottery results for all the magnet schools.