| The most interesting item on the Fort Bend ISD board of trustees agenda Monday wasn't an action item but a discussion item, to "discuss engagement with the communities of High School No. 10 and Middle School No. 12 related to the issues of who will be attending these schools."
Trustee Stan Magee said he and fellow board member Ken Bryant wanted to add the item to the agenda because Magee said he has been contacted by numerous constituents of both communities.
"Both of these communities, one is on the west end and one is on the east end of the district," Magee said, "the general public is saying they would like to offer some more viable opportunities as to who might be attending these schools.
"I know things have happened already, decisions were made before I became a member of this board," he continued, "but for those two schools to have a public forum as early in August as possible, because we need to move as quickly as we can to get some more input from the general public."
Dr. Betty Baitland, FBSID's superintendent reminded the board that the students in the attendance zone of Middle School No. 12 are attending specially-arranged schools beginning in August in preparation for the new school opening for the fall 2006 school year.
"The public is involved in (the district's) attendance boundary process," Baitland said, "and although we're not in love with that process, we change our zoning process every few years because it's never popular.
"We did have community involvement in that we had many board meetings at which citizens spoke," Baitland continued, "and we all have had many conversations about the (zoning) issues in our community.
"At the board's recommendation to me," Baitland said, "the administration has sought out to review our attendance boundary process this summer, and put the process in motion to begin to make changes this fall."
"We just need to ensure that the process has some element involving the community," Bryant said. "I think we've done a good job in communicating the process to the community."
Although Magee continued to push for a public forum to possibly change the attendance zones for the new schools, the board and the administration agreed they would hold public forums to receive input from the community on the zoning process only.
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