By Jim Levesque

Katy ISD Superintendent Alton L. Frailey stressed it wasn't a "doomsday" meeting Oct. 20 when trustees heard recommendations from a community volunteer advisory committee on what the district could do to cope with its growing enrollment if the school bond fails at the polls in early November.

Laura Freeman gave a presentation to the school board at its workshop meeting about the "most preferred" and "least preferred" options brought to the committee by the school district. The committee, made up of members of the Katy Improvement Council, the Parent Roundtable, the Employee Roundtable and the Leadership Team, also discussed its own ideas.

The $748 proposed bond calls for, among other things, six new campuses—one high school, two junior high schools and three elementary schools—school officials said would help house the expected growth of 3,000 students each year. However, if the bond fails, the school district will have to educate its growing student body in its current facilities.

The "most preferred" options determined by the committee included the use of portable classrooms, creating new attendance boundaries to rezone school enrollment, repurposing space within campuses [gyms, libraries, stages and commons areas] for general classroom use and investigating options for other instruction delivery methods.

Other "most preferred" options included reviewing the use of space within support facilities like the Merrell Center and the Outdoor Learning Center for more classrooms, capping school enrollment, breaking a grade level out of one campus and moving it to another, eliminating inter-district transfers and brining another bond to the polls in the spring.

The advisory group's "least preferred" options included eliminating non-mandatory programs and classes, increasing class sizes, using other scheduling options such as year-round school, leasing space for classrooms and eliminating assigned classrooms for secondary teachers.

"Regardless of the result of this bond referendum, we're, obviously, charged with doing the best that we can for the students of the district," said school board president Bryan Michalsky. "We are absolutely going to do that. Now, certainly, we are looking at some of these options—most of them are not appealing. So, it will create some additional challenges that we'll have to review."

Frailey said that the school district is open to any other options not yet put in front of trustees.

"This is still open-ended," Frailey said. "If somebody out there has a great idea on how we can go without having any more facilities built, please, send them to me."