With Dave and Sheree Suchma Elementary School slated to open for the 2019-20 school year, Conroe ISD officials are working to redraw the attendance boundaries of schools with minimal effects to CISD students.
Suchma Elementary School, previously known as Flex 19, will open as a K-6 school in Harper’s Preserve as part of the Oak Ridge High School feeder zone in August 2019. To prepare for the new school, CISD established a 25-member Attendance Boundary Committee to develop and propose possible zoning scenarios to submit to the community for feedback. The committee comprises administrators, principals and parent representatives.
The ABC is considering two attendance boundary scenarios. CISD officials said the ABC considers a variety of factors when developing zoning scenarios, including campus capacity, effects on families, transportation patterns, demographics and the possible locations of future schools.
In scenarios 1 and 2, students who reside in Ponderosa Timbers, Lexington, Oak Forest, Whispering Oaks, Hickory Ridge, Tall Timbers Section 3 and Montgomery Creek Ranch will move from Houston Elementary School to Suchma. Students who live in Harper’s Preserve, the Tall Timbers section south of Hwy. 242, Gleneagles south of Hwy. 242 and Dogwood Forest will move from Oak Ridge Elementary School to Suchma.
Additionally, in both scenarios students south of Sawdust Road and east of Pruitt Road will move from Lamar Elementary School to Houser Elementary School to create capacity at Lamar so a bilingual program can be added. Students north of Timber Lakes will move from Hailey Elementary School to Glen Loch Elementary School to relieve capacity at Hailey in both scenarios.
“Scenario 1 impacts fewer families than Scenario 2, but the cons with Scenario 1 are that we do not reduce overcrowding at Glen Loch Elementary or Ride Elementary,” Deputy Superintendent Chris Hines said.
In Scenario 2, students who live in the apartments south of FM 1488 near I-45 and in the Dominion Apartments will move from Powell Elementary School to Houser to create capacity at Powell and to relieve Ride, which is currently overcapacity by 102 students, according to CISD. Students who live in Jacobs Reserve east of Jacobs Lake Boulevard and north and south of Jacobs Reserve Boulevard will also move from Ride to Powell in Scenario 2.
“Some of the negative aspects of Scenario 2 is that it splits a large neighborhood and creates an additional group of students who are attending elementary school outside of the high school feeder,” Hines said.
In both scenarios, Suchma will have an attendance of approximately 853 students. The school’s capacity is 1,000 students.
The ABC hosted three community meetings about the zoning process and three additional meetings in November for the community to provide feedback on proposed scenarios. Three additional community meetings are scheduled on Jan.8-9, during which the ABC will present the proposed zoning recommendations.
“Both scenarios fill our new elementary school, which allows us [to] examine options for relieving overcrowding at other campuses,” Hines said. “It is always difficult to rezone because of the impact any adjustment has on our community.”
