What happened
Superintendent Milton "Rob" Fields III said the district started its Growth and Planning Committee to hear from both the district and members of the community, which included discussion of the ways they could repurpose Coronado Village Elementary School.
“One of the things that came up was our [Disciplinary Alternative Education Program]. If you look at our DAEP, they’re really struggling with the area that they’re in right now, and then we got feedback from the community that that wasn’t something that was truly wanted over in Coronado,” Fields said during the town hall.
Based on the feedback from the community, Fields said they will continue to look at ways to repurpose Coronado Village Elementary School, but part of that repurposing would not include the district’s DAEP campus.
“We don’t feel comfortable making a recommendation to move DAEP to Coronado, so that’s not something that we’re even going to bring to the board at this time,” Fields said.
Some context
The Judson ISD board of trustees voted to move students from Coronado Village to Selma Elementary School in December. In January, a presentation was given to the district’s Growth and Planning Committee for repurposing Coronado Village into the district’s secondary alternative school—JCARE.
The presentation identified challenges in JCARE’s current facility, which include limited library, cafeteria, parking and storage space. A few of the benefits for moving JCARE to Coronado Village Elementary identified in the presentation were having a full-size library for classroom instruction and a full-size cafeteria for student lunches, safety training and student/parent meetings.
The committee also received presentations from the special education department and Judson ISD Police Department vying to use this space for their respective departments.
A closer look
The district conducted a survey asking what priorities should guide the district in repurposing the former elementary school building. Surveyors were asked to select their top three.
Respondents indicated that they want the district to prioritize expanding community and adult education programs, and creating a workforce development or career training center, according to survey results.
What the community is saying
Robert Whiting, a resident of Coronado Village, spoke during a Universal City City Council meeting Feb. 18 on behalf of the Save Our Neighborhood Committee—a group of taxpayers and voters primarily from the Coronado Village community.
Whiting said he and other residents were concerned that repurposing the elementary school into a DAEP facility would impact resident safety, decrease property values and prevent attracting new families into the neighborhood.
During a Feb. 20 Judson ISD school board meeting, Universal City resident Kari Carlson said she was against housing the district’s DAEP program in the former elementary school facility.
“I am 100% in support of giving attention to and helping people who have kind of fallen through the cracks—I think it’s really important. I just don’t think that Coronado Village is the place to do that,” Carlson said during the public comment period.
