Sign the petition currently circulated which advocates that we NOT close Hoover Elementary School in the Iowa City Community School District. Someone will circulate petitions at the play-off game tonight (Wed., 10/30/13) at City. At least one or two of the pro-Hoover group will be at the Iowa City Public Library this Friday, Nov. 1st, with petitions to sign.
One reason not to close Hoover Elementary School is that the board and the district want to close it without spelling out what they want to use the Hoover property for. Transparency is definitely lacking. We need walkable neighborhood schools, especially since buses cost approximately $40,000 apiece and we could have a schoolbus driver strike soon.
Negotiations between Durham schoolbus drivers, represented by the Teamsters Union, and Durham School Services have stalled. Durham wants new Durham bus drivers to take a pay cut to pay for the recent wage increases for senior drivers (meaning drivers who've managed to stick at Durham for a year or more).
A federal mediation is scheduled for November. There could be a strike.
The school district's desire to build new schools further out of town and transport students by bus and close walkable inner-city neighborhood schools makes schools vulnerable to school bus driver strikes. Not only that, but increasing the need for buses when each bus costs $40,000, the approximate cost of a teacher, seems a poor way to focus on education as opposed to transportation.
I remember when the Hawkeye Area Community Action Program had to choose between seats for preschool children at Head Start versus transportation for those children. They chose seats over transportation, and most parents, although extremely poor, found a way to bring their children to preschool, but not everyone could.
What happened to the ICCSD's motto of "child-focused"? Are they "bus-focused" as opposed to "child-focused" or "teacher-focused"? Will there come a time when they have to make a choice?
Maybe the district is also "landowner-focused" and "contractor-focused." Their last priorities, after they've paid landowners for land to build new schools on and for the work of innumerable contractors to do administrators' jobs for them and do them badly, seem to be the child, the family, and the community.
Little legs walking or long legs biking to school seems like a good thing. My kids walked and biked to school, even in college, and so did my husband and I when we went to public schools.
It beats me why the district wants to spread out our schools to rely on the City of Iowa City Transit, Durham School Services, and close down walkable schools instead. The district and the board could at least tell us why, but they don't, do they? So since they won't tell us why Hoover needs to be closed and what they're going to use the lot for, why should we support their decision?
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