The Salem-Keizer Public Schools (SKPS) Board of Education received a recommendation report on boundary adjustments at its business meeting Tuesday, Jan. 15, 2019.
The report describes the work of the Boundary Review Task Force, a group of 45 community members who worked together to create a boundary adjustment proposal to balance enrollments across all Salem-Keizer high school feeder systems.
Salem-Keizer Superintendent Christy Perry initiated the boundary review process to relieve overcrowding and prepare schools for future enrollment growth. Salem and Keizer continue to grow, with student enrollment totaling more than 42,000.
Boundary adjustments are also needed to ensure that new spaces being constructed in the 2018 bond program will be fully utilized. Thanks to the community’s passage of a bond in May, SKPS will invest $619.7 million in Salem and Keizer in the form of school expansions, renovations and improvements over the next five to six years. Boundary adjustments will shift students away from crowded conditions and into these new, improved learning environments.
The School Board will discuss the Boundary Review Task Force recommendations and hear public testimony at a work session scheduled for Tues., Jan. 22, 2019. The Board is scheduled to vote on the proposal at its Feb. 12, 2019 meeting. If approved, the boundary changes will go into effect in September 2019.