Report: 6 of JCPS elementary schools over capacity

Students in Maria Reece's first grade class at Moreau Heights Elementary School wait quietly in the hallway for their turn to use the restroom. Although Moreau Heights was not specifcally named, based on a new architectural report, several elementary schools in the Jefferson City Public Schools district are facing overcrowding.
Students in Maria Reece's first grade class at Moreau Heights Elementary School wait quietly in the hallway for their turn to use the restroom. Although Moreau Heights was not specifcally named, based on a new architectural report, several elementary schools in the Jefferson City Public Schools district are facing overcrowding.

The planned opening of Capital City High School in August will be a major milestone for Jefferson City Public Schools in addressing its facilities needs.

But the recent approval of mobile classrooms for Thomas Jefferson Middle School and a new report showing most of the districts' elementary schools are filled beyond desired student capacities are also evidence the district has a lot of work ahead of it to address ongoing space needs.

The JCPS Board of Education approved contracts at its May 13 meeting to pay for two mobile classroom units for Thomas Jefferson - needed to accommodate additional teachers and classrooms for extra sections of reading, though it was not yet known which classes would be in the mobile units.

Currently, four other JCPS buildings besides Thomas Jefferson have one or more mobile units: Jefferson City High School as renovations take place, as well as Callaway Hills, East and Pioneer Trail elementary schools.

That is an improvement over the way things used to be; a draft "Jefferson City School District Detailed Strategic Plan, 1998-2003," dated Oct. 7, 1997, counted 21 mobile classrooms at eight elementary schools in the district.

A new report last month from Kansas City-based ACI Boland Architects details in floor plans of each JCPS elementary school that Callaway Hills' trailer is divided for use for "music/empty" and "orchestra/behavior;" East's trailer for "staff resource/instructional coach" and social worker; and Pioneer Trail's as a space for English as a second language work.

Jason Hoffman, JCPS chief financial and operating officer, said last week that the music class in Callaway Hills' mobile unit will be going back into that school building next year, while the other side of the trailer will continue to be used for orchestra - a one hour, twice a week activity - and Parents as Teachers and other support services.

Hoffman also said mobile units at the corner of Jackson and Union streets are considered part of JCHS and not Nichols Career Center.

ACI Boland released a more comprehensive "School Facilities Appraisal" of JCPS' buildings in December 2013 that in addition to calculating student capacities also rated buildings' sites; structural and mechanical features; maintainability; safety and security; educational adequacy; and environment for education.

The new report in May only provides updated "desirable" student capacities based on more recent state standards of how many students can be in a classroom for a certain grade level.

Based on the updated desirable student capacities, ACI Boland found six of JCPS' 11 elementary schools were over capacity this year - Belair, Cedar Hill, Lawson, North, Pioneer Trail and Thorpe Gordon - and a seventh school, South, was exactly at its student enrollment capacity of 317.

North Elementary School was calculated as the most over-capacity, with 55 more enrolled students this year than its desired capacity, followed by Cedar Hill at 43 more enrolled students than capacity, and Pioneer Trail with 39 more students than capacity.

Brenda Hatfield, JCPS director of quality improvement, said last month that "There's still opportunities in certain buildings" for creative use of available spaces, but "I don't think we have any choice" but to add new square footage to the district - be it through adding on to existing buildings or constructing new buildings.

ACI Boland noted in its latest report that since 2014, Belair, Lawson, South and Thorpe Gordon are among the schools that had increased their classroom counts by one or two.

However, ACI Boland also described the ways school staff have adapted to the limited availability of space: "We observed elementary schools that with few exceptions were functioning well but at the absolute top end of functional capacity. Anecdotes supporting that include: Buildings with electives like music or art served 'on a cart' to save space for grade level classrooms; (occupational and physical therapy) special-education services being provided pull out settings in hallways and nooks; staff spaces or curriculum storage spaces doubling as small group pull out spaces; buildings that did not have any flexibility is an 'extra section' materialized for the following year; and building administrators having to rank or prioritize programs against other programs to determine access to standalone space."

On paper, ACI Boland's report showed Lewis and Clark Middle School was still 115 enrolled students away from reaching its capacity this year, and Thomas Jefferson was over-capacity by four students - but Hoffman said last month that's not the full picture.

"It is important to note that the middle school capacity numbers have increased only because we have creatively used the common space for classrooms. Using the common spaces for classrooms alleviates the space needs some, but this prevents our middle schools from delivering education in the manner that is considered a best practice for this age group. So, while we may come closer to meeting the standard, this is only a short-term solution for these buildings," Hoffman wrote in an email.

Hoffman said in an interview last month that the division of common spaces at the middle schools - which is detailed in the report and he talked about at the Board of Education's most recent meeting - does not refer to the schools' cafeterias but to putting up drywall on one side of an existing folding wall between the two halves of large classrooms that the middle schools have in their wings, one on the main level of each school and two on the upper level.

He said the temporary walls of drywall will not extend past the rooms' dropped ceilings, but that does mean some sound will carry up and over to the other side.

Hoffman added it would not make sense to add on to the existing middle schools, because of the large numbers of students they have already - 965 this year at Lewis and Clark and 1,084 at Thomas Jefferson.

In terms of when the district could expect to issue a new, no-tax increase bond issue to finance a new construction project or projects, Hoffman said that would be March 2021 - after the April 2020 municipal election - at the earliest.