Washington Gardens

Our Oakleaf Hammock neighborhood is not zoned for the new Middle school Buffalo Creek. For the benefit of our children we need to make phone calls and make Oakleaf Hammock zone for it.

These are the numbers for us to contact:
School Board Office: 941-708-8770,
Parent information: 941-708-4971 x211
District Assistant Patricia E Lucas 708-8770 ext 2218.

Otherwise our Children will be going to Palmetto Schools (Lincoln & Palmetto High).


By Paula & Nick

Buffalo Creek Middle School???

We agree with you!

Our neighborhood will (almost) borderline with the new school (Buffalo Creek) property. Our children could ride bikes to school. We're already zoned to the next door Mills Elementary school, but not to the Buffalo Creek Middle. In our case, we'll have this year 2 kids going to the Mills school and the 3rd one we'll have to shuttle across the town over 7 miles to Lincoln.

What we heard so far, Lincoln Middle has bad reputation... Here are some quotes taken from :

?“We had out child at Lincoln Middle School for only 1 semester. After 2 weeks of being there he was begging us to attend another middle school. He would tell us about the endless number of fights each day during lunch.?”

?“Palmetto police are always present to break up fights and drugs seized''

In our opinion and what we heard so far from other Manatee district employees, Lincoln school has high number of kids from low income homes and to balance, the school district sending some of them to Buffalo Creek and zoned our neighborhood to attend Lincoln Middle school. Counting that the Lincoln school reputation will change and the crime incident get lower. The district has a problem and is using our neighborhoods to correct it. (It's our opinion) You?’re welcome to comment...

The question is:

ARE WE GOING TO SACRIFICE OUR KIDS TO HELP THE SCHOOL DISTRICT TO LOOK GOOD ON THE STATE RECORDS?

Les & Simone


By Les & Simone

I agree

Thanks for the reminder!!

Letter from Superintendent...

Follow up letter from our district superintendent:

?“Thank you for your follow-up e-mail. I have been out of town for about 10 days, and wanted to respond to your inquiry.

The opening of the new middle school required the rezoning of part of Lincoln Middle School's students to that new zone.

The way our redistricting works, we are not allowed to take any students into the new school from out of zone for one year, unless it is an emergency or medical necessity.

As you know, we do provide bus transportation from your area to Lincoln Middle School. And, Lincoln was the only middle school for the entire area north of the river until this new school (which opens in August) was built.

After the first year, the out of zones will be based upon need and staff allocations. But right now, Buffalo Creek has 53 students more registered than we have teachers allocated. We will have to make adjustments with personnel if all of those students actual attend.

For all of those reasons, your out of zone request to Buffalo Creek must be turned down.

Sincerely,

Dr. Roger Dearing
Superintendent
dearingr@fc.manatee.k12.fl.us?”


By Lou & Paula