Schools

Gwinnett BOE Hosting Area II, III Meetings This Week

Meetings provide opportunities to comment on redistricting in Duluth, Peachtree Ridge clusters.

Anyone wanting to sound off about the proposed redistricting involving the Duluth and Peachtree Ridge school clusters will have an opportunity to do so this week.

Gwinnett County Public Schools are holding board meetings in the various districts. District II, which includes the Peachtree Ridge, North Gwinnett and Collins Hill clusters, met Tuesday (March 29) at Lanier High School. Daniel Seckinger, District II representative on the Gwinnett Board of Education, hostd the meeting. 

The District III meeting will occur Thursday (March 31) at Norcross High School at 7 p.m. The meeting will be hosted by Mary Kay Murphy, who represents District III.

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

Controversy has ensued since GCPS announced in February that it plans to move about 580 students from the Peachtree Ridge Cluster to the Duluth Cluster for the 2011-12 school year. Also, about 120 students are targeted to move within the Duluth Cluster.

At the March school board meeting, Duluth Mayor Nancy Harris, speaking on behalf of the Duluth City Council, read a statement opposing the proposed redistricting. Murphy, who represents the Duluth Cluster and part of the Peachtree Ridge Cluster, has said she will not vote for the plan in its current form.

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

District III also includes the Norcross Cluster.

Among other things, the current redistricting proposal would move the areas around Gwinnett Place Mall, which is heavy with transitional housing, back into the Duluth Cluster.

"We don't make decisions based on socioeconomic factors," Seckinger said after the March school board meeting. "If we did, we'd be taken to court, and we'd lose." Seckinger said he has not decided how he will vote on the redistricting.

Public input is being sought, and a new redistricting map is expected to be developed by April 18. A public hearing is scheduled April 20, and the Gwinnett BOE is scheduled to vote on the redistricting at its April 21 meeting.

 For more information on the meetings or the redistricting, visit the school system's website.


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