ABC2 ran an excellent follow-up story on its 11 p.m. report last night, detailing the jump in enrollment this fall at Rodgers Forge Elementary School.
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Archive for August, 2008
BCPS officials have told Towson Families United that plans for a new elementary school in Towson are well underway and that the project is still scheduled to open in the fall of 2010. This was welcome news for parents at Rodgers Forge Elementary, who last week learned that their school had enrolled an alarming 714 students, putting the school at 180% capacity.
Over the summer, a site plan for the new school was drawn up and presented at an August 3rd meeting of the county’s Development Review Committee. A copy of the plan is attached as a pdf, below.
The two story building will be situated on the south side of the school system land — to the left of the existing Ridge Ruxton School. Both schools will share an entranceway off of Charles Street. The current bus loop and parking lots will be expanded to accomodate both schools. The site designers left the treed buffer along Charles Street, as well many of the trees and the tennis courts on the back of the property. As proposed, the new school will have two playgrounds — one for kindergarten and first-graders, and another for grades two through five.
School officials are considering three names for the new school: Towson West Elementary, Greenwood Elementary and Boyce Elementary.
A more comprehensive architectural plan for the new school will be made available in September.
To view the site plan for Towson’s new elementary school, click on the pdf below. You can rotate the plan and enlarge it in your pdf viewer.
newschoolplan.pdf
At a meeting for parents of kindergartners and first-graders Thursday night, Rodgers Forge Elementary principal Susan Deise announced that 714 students have signed up for school this fall — in a building designed for 396 students. That brings Rodgers Forge to 180% capacity — the highest in the state of Maryland. Audible gasps were heard in the packed room, but Mrs. Diese quickly assured parents that the school system was going above and beyond to handle the overflow.
Specifically, she said each of the five kindergarten classes this year will have both a teacher and a full-time, instructional aide. Last year, the kindergarten classes had to share just one aide. In other grades, the school has hired additional teachers to make sure class sizes remain manageable. Nevertheless, the sheer number of students now — which exceeds even last year’s school system projections — has put an understandable strain on school operations. So it’s more important than ever to support the administration, staff and teachers there.
Mrs. Deise credited strong parental pressure on the school system for getting these additional teachers and aides, as well as other necessary equipment and services to handle such a large student body.
Official enrollment numbers will not be updated on the TFU website until they are announced in late September.
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