BEDFORD, Ind. (WDRB) -- Some parents in southern Indiana are fighting their school corporation’s plan to close four elementary schools, in part because officials made the decision after holding meetings behind closed doors.
A state official ruled that those meetings violated the public’s right to provide input, but the North Lawrence Community School Corp. is fighting that ruling in court.
Parents including Trischa Turner, whose son Maxwell attends Fayetteville Elementary School in Bedford, have filed a lawsuit to prevent the corporation from carrying out its plan.
“We want them to stop this process, and we want them to start over, and we want them to do it the right way,” she told WDRB News.
Trischa Turner
School officials said the plan to close Fayetteville, Heltonville and Springville elementary schools and convert Stalker Elementary into an early learning center at the end of the school year is a matter of math.
Student enrollment is declining, meaning the corporation is getting less money from the state, and at the same time, costs for operating the schools are rising.
The corporation has 4,670 students this year, according to the Indiana Department of Education. That's down 7% in the last four years.
Enrollment in early grades is down much more. The number of kindergartners has fallen nearly 14% in the last four years. Enrollment in grades 2 and 3 is down more than 10%.
School officials said they’re using money from savings to plug holes in their $50 million budget.
The school board approved the closings plan last month in a vote of 4 to 3.
Ty Mungle
Superintendent Ty Mungle said the plan would balance the corporation’s budget.
“At some time, you have to look at when we have a number of empty classrooms, do we continue to keep this school open?” he said.
Mungle also said that the proposed changes will improve the students’ education.
“All of our schools will be offering the same type of programs and the same opportunities for all of our students in all of our schools," he said. "That is not the case right now."
Turner said she understands the dynamics but said school officials did not allow the public enough opportunities to direct to guide the consolidation.
A 30-person committee appointed by Mungle held eight private meetings to discuss the plan, and Indiana's Public Access Counselor ruled those meetings violated Indiana's Open Door Law.
Turner and other parents have filed a lawsuit to void the work that was done in those unlawful meetings.
"I want that process to be transparent, and we need to have some insight into it to make sure that things are not happening unethically behind a closed curtain," she said.
However, the school corporation has filed a lawsuit to ask a judge to reverse the access counselor’s decision.
Mungle said the corporation developed the plan to improve educational outcomes.
“There's no other reason we would have done this other than we see a brighter future for our students,” he said.
Turner, however, said school officials’ actions have weakened the basis for proper cooperation with parents.
“There’s a huge amount of distrust in the administration,” she said.
Both lawsuits are awaiting a judge’s ruling in Lawrence County Circuit Court.
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