WBTV 3 News, Weather, Sports, and Traffic for Charlotte, NC-CMS board discussing assignment changes for Myers Park, East Meck, Eastover

CMS board discussing assignment changes for Myers Park, East Meck, Eastover

Tom Roussey - bio l email 

CHARLOTTE, NC (WBTV) - The CMS board is discussing their staff's school assignment plan involving several Charlotte high schools and elementary schools.

After tons of controversy over ideas to keep Myers Park High from being twice the size of East Meck High, CMS staff is recommending doing almost nothing.  That's not sitting well with some board members.

"Three thousand kids is too big!" said CMS board member Joe White about Myers Park High's projected enrollment for next year.  "Unless you can clone King Kong and make him an assistant principal, 3-thousand kids is too large."

One thing the CMS staff did propose is to put a Science, Technology, Engineering and Math Program (STEM) at East Meck High.  It would not be a magnet program, but the CMS staff believes it would encourage more kids to go to East Meck as opposed to other places.

Some board members had originially wanted to take some students from a similar program at Harding University High School and send them to East Meck, but it now appears Harding will not be affected at all by whatever the board decides.

The board also put out new recommendations involving relieving overcrowding at Eastover Elementary School.

They involve changing Dilworth Elementary from a magnet to a neighborhood school, and taking Dilworth's arts magnet program and sending it to First Ward Elementary.

"This is insane," board member Larry Gauvreau said of the plan.  Gauvreau thinks it's a waste of taxpayer money and wants the board to look at a simpler option to relieve Eastover overcrowding.  He wants the board to send some Eastover kids to Billingsville Elementary, which is close by and has room for more kids.

But board member Trent Merchant gave the elementary plan a more positive reception.

"I don't think we should just bash this proposal, because there's a lot of good in it," Merchant said.