Schools in Lee County and Phenix City that will be affected by BRAC have no choice. They must be prepared for an influx of thousands students, beginning in 2010.
But they know action must be taken — and taken immediately. Our schools have to be fully prepared for the increased enrollment numbers or the schools and their students will suffer from classroom overcrowding and increased student-to-teacher ratios.
Several area school officials, including Lee County Schools Interim Superintendent Dr. Stephen Nowlin and Phenix City Schools Superintendent Dr. Larry DiChiara, met Tuesday with BRAC representatives in Columbus, Ga., regarding the troop expansion at nearby Fort Benning.
East Alabama is growing fast enough on its own, and school funding to keep up with the growth is difficult already. Measures to increase school funding, including a proposed tax increase, were shot down by Lee County voters last August. If our schools don’t already have the fiscal resources to give our children the best education possible, what do we think will happen in two to three years when thousands of children are introduced as their classmates?
New students will create a demand for more classroom space, more food in the lunch room and more teachers, etc., the same way a growing population increases the demand for housing, more roads and properly planned water and sewage systems.
DiChiara, who has a long history as a leading official within Lee County Schools before taking the helm in Phenix City, said that local school administrators “shouldn’t have to be magicians and pull rabbits out of our hat.”
He’s right. But it appears they might have to. Realizing he and his comrades can do little about the oncoming storm, DiChiara added, “We’ll adjust. We’ll do the best we can with what we’ve got.”
We commend all school officials, including DiChiara and Nowlin, who continue to take steps to have their school systems prepared the best they can for the flood of
students.
It’s time systems exhaust all means to ready themselves, and it’s never a bad idea to ask residents to chip in from time to time.
After all, it’s their children’s education.
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