BROKEN ARROW, Okla. — Broken Arrow and Jenks districts approved boundary changes, which will move some students from one school to another starting next year.
2 News wanted to investigate why these districts said they felt compelled to make these decisions.
"We see everything growing. All these apartments—I wonder where they are going to put all these people and what they are going to do with them. And you have to think about the children because children come with the families," said former BAPS substitute teacher and grandmother Miriam Flanagan.
It was just before the district parent forum on Oct. 24 when we spoke with her.
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Since then, BA approved its redistricting plans, and Jenks announced and approved theirs.
"So, many factors outside of our control that we try really hard to be proactive," said Assistant Superintendent Ashley Bowser
When talking with families and district leaders, there was a common thread: the increase in housing developments around the school districts.
These housing developments bring in new families some with kids who need to go to school, adding to the population in the districts.
"I know this way there is a lot of congestion with new developments," said Jenks parent Kelsey Graham.
Jenks and Broken Arrow are both booming communities that are seeing a spike in families.
With the large new neighborhoods come new demographics, and unbalancing school sites.
"This neighborhood here has seven phases and 738 homes, it hasn’t started yet so we don’t know exactly when it’s going to happen but these are, this is just demonstrative of some of the challenges we have," said Bowser.
He said these types of developments are making it hard for the districts to predict changes.
"This one is about to zero out. 220 planned 201 completed and 19 still active but a lot of these others are not even close to zeroing out well that’s the challenge we are trying to plan for the redistricting and how the schools can accommodate kids," Bowser said.
He said the growth is great, but the district needs to keep up. 2 News asked if they've been involved in conversations when the city allows the developments. He said they knew of the developments and plans for most.
The district said it often attends county commission meetings when developments are proposed.
He said that’s why redistricting is sometimes the only option.
"We embrace growth. We want our school district to grow, but we want it to grow at a manageable pace," said Bowser.
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