This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Schools

School Board to Decide Fate of Aliso Elementary Tonight

The Lake Forest school is the only one being considered for closure on tonight's agenda.

The Saddleback Valley Unified School District’s board of trustees is scheduled to vote tonight on whether it will close Aliso Elementary at the end of the school year. The meeting is expected to draw scores of Aliso parents hoping to persuade the board not to shutter the school.

The Lake Forest site is the only one being considered for closure on tonight’s agenda. It was one of three operational schools deemed a “surplus” property last week by the district’s 7/11 Real Property Advisory Committee. The others—Trabuco and Linda Vista Elementary schools—were not named in the agenda.

Closing Aliso Elementary would save $400,000, according to the district, which is experiencing the highest rate of declining enrollment in the county. SVUSD is losing $3.8 million a year due to declining enrollment, officials say, and in 2010 had an excess capacity of 2,925 spots for its elementary school students.

Find out what's happening in Mission Viejowith free, real-time updates from Patch.

If the board votes to close Aliso, its 385 students would be moved to Santiago, Olivewood and Rancho Canada Elementary Schools.

Several Aliso parents who spoke at the district’s 7/11 Committee meetings about their concerns that Saddleback Valley Unified was violating the law and rushing the process toward school closures said they plan to mobilize their school to turn out for tonight’s meeting.

Find out what's happening in Mission Viejowith free, real-time updates from Patch.

“We passed out Save Aliso T-shirts to every student,” said Allyson Shimasaki, an Aliso parent. “We’re hoping to get every family there.”

Some parents have raised concerns about whether the district’s enrollment projections take into account some 4,300 new homes slated to be built in Lake Forest in the coming years. Shimasaki said Aliso parents will also be bringing new petitions and surveys to show that the community opposes the school closure.

In other board business on the agenda, members of the Saddleback Valley Education Coalition—which includes teacher and employee unions as well as the PTA—are expected to address the board about their efforts to lobby legislators and community members this week to preserve funding for California’s schools.

The board is being asked to approve a resolution in support of the Education Coalition’s statewide May 9-13 Week of Action. The resolution notes that SVUSD has already cut $58 million from its budget in the past three years and “will be forced to cut an additional $20 million from its budget if the Legislature does not pass revenue extensions.”

 The board is also scheduled to honor three classified employees of the year: Wanda L. O’Brien, school office manager at Los Alisos Intermediate School; Juan H. Medina, plant foreman at Trabuco Hills High School; and Janis Reisdorf, a student services technician at Mission Viejo High School.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?