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Hamilton County: Candidates debate open enrollment

By: Kelli Gauthier
(Contact)

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School board candidates forum

Administrators in Hamilton County should get rid of school zones and allow students to attend any school they choose, school board candidates said Friday.

The system should continue offering bus routes for students to attend schools in their neighborhood, but if they choose to attend other county schools, the students or their parents would be responsible for their own transportation, said Rhonda Thurman, who is running unopposed for her District 1 seat.

“As far as diversity, you can go to any school you want to, so I don’t see how that’s discriminatory against anyone,” she said. “If you go to Howard and you want to go to Soddy-Daisy, that’s fine.”

Ms. Thurman said her plan was similar to the way the county school system transported students before the 1997 merger with the city school system. Her comments came during a school board candidate forum hosted Friday by the Chattanooga Association of Realtors.

Since Hamilton County has underutilized school facilities, administrators could determine which buildings to close based on the number of students choosing to attend, Ms. Thurman said.

“If people don’t even want to support their neighborhood schools, those are the schools we ought to look at closing,” she said. “Let the public decide which schools to close.”

District 7 candidate Linda Mosley agreed with Ms. Thurman, saying the school system could close unpopular schools and duplicate those that were successful.

“That way, if people wanted to go to a certain school, they’d have a second alternative somewhere else,” she said.

Ms. Mosley added that, with the high cost of fuel, having some parents pick up the tab for their children’s school transportation would save Hamilton County Schools money.

District 2 school board incumbent Chip Baker and Ms. Mosley’s District 7 opponent, Michael Dzik, agreed that magnet schools provided enough school choice for Hamilton County parents.

Mr. Dzik’s two daughters attend Westview Elementary, which is crowded with more than 700 students, he said. If all students were able to choose which school they wanted to attend, Mr. Dzik said he worried that some schools would just continue to become more overcrowded.

“If we start having open enrollment, where do you cut it off?” he asked. “Maybe we can allow it in schools that are not overcrowded. I just think we need to be careful.”

But a little competition to get into some of the schools might not be a bad thing, said District 2 candidate Dr. Joe Dumas.

“If we had people clamoring to get into a school, if they were willing to transport their kid across town to get into a school, I think that would be wonderful,” he said. “We should encourage that.”

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