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Superintendents from Lewis and Gilmer say they're hopeful elementary schools from their respective counties can be combined into one new elementary school.
The Clay County Board of Education recently discussed the idea of creating a regional elementary school in the Lizemore area to serve Clay, Nicholas, and Fayette county students.
Officials have declared structural problems make a Preston County school at Tunnelton unsafe, with recommendations to bus students to a centralized or other area school.
Challenge WV has supported community leaders to get an independent opinion about that structure from WVU. So far that group has said the structure is basically sound.
"While multi-county schools having students cross county lines seems like a good idea, it is the state's foot-in-the-door system of eliminating community schools," said Thomas Ramey, Challenge WV executive director.
Ramey said rural, community school buildings have long been ignored. "They can reach a point of disrepair that makes a justifiable reason to close them," he said.
He says the focus of state officials is close about 125 more elementary schools, sometimes creating long bus rides of up to two hours one-way for children as young as three.
The idea for multi-county schools is an idea that has become reality in several West Virginia communities, mostly with high schools.
Now, the focus is on elementary schools.
Lewis County Superintendent Dr. Joseph Mace says Alum Bridge Elementary School has only 126 students, and the old school needs to be upgraded.
Dr. Mace said because of the low enrollment, the school does not qualify for state School Building Authority grants, so he wants to combine the Lewis County school with Troy Elementary in Gilmer County.
He told a local TV station, "If Alum Bridge and Troy Elementary at Linn would combine, we could meet the economies of scale and I think qualify for state School Building Authority money to build a beautiful new school."
Dr. Mark Manchin, who heads the School Building Authority, has said the state does not use the economies of scale model for consolidation.
Dr. Mace told a local TV station the new school could be built in the town of Linn, Gilmer County, which he says is an equal distance, concluding the new school could be built with School Building Authority money and wouldn't cost taxpayers anything.
Mace, in making the comments, apparently failed to acknowledge it is taxpayer money, nonetheless, just from a different money stream.
Gilmer County Superintendent Edward Toman says his elementary students (Troy, Sand Fork and Normantown) are definitely in need of better facilities.
State officials recently did a walk-through of Sand Fork and Troy elementary in Gilmer County, indicating they are structurally unsound.
Parents in those communities are up in arms about the loss of their schools.
The state consistently recommends to local boards they hire Williamson Shriver Architects of Charleston to make a declarative analysis of structures, while the same firm often receives contracts to develop plans to make the repairs or build a new school.
"Some would call that conflict of interest," said Ramey, a line often blurred in the Mountain State.
Dr. Mace says he is hopeful both school boards will be moving the idea of combining schools further. Still, the local boards would have to buy the land.
West Virginia education officials are maintaining concern about the condition of Troy and Sand Fork Elementary schools following a walk-through, similar to problems discovered at Normantown, which resulted in a closure effort to consolidate the school with Glenville Elementary.
Superintendent Ed Toman advised Gilmer school board members about the letter from state administrator Bill Elswick, saying he did not initiate the inspection.
The Normantown students are now attending class in modular units, following the discovery of a mold problem in 2007.
That closure was followed by an administrative move, opposed by a majority of board members, to bus Normantown's students to Glenville Elementary.
Gilmer school board member Misty Pritt said new rumors are flying like wildfire in the community regarding the use of structure problems to eliminate the community schools.
"LOOK BEHIND THE METHOD" SAYS RAMEY
"Multi-County school consolidations are extremely dangerous to the fiber of our educational democratic process," Ramey said.
County school systems are often financially supplemented through the support of local citizens by way of excess levies. Regional consolidations have resulted in statewide discussions around the issue of "taxation without representation".
Ramey gave the example of Lincoln County, currently the county has a 100% excess levy.
The high school children living in the Harts area of Lincoln County are largely being educated in neighboring Logan County.
Even though the Harts area is taxed along with the rest of Lincoln County for the excess levy, most of their high school aged children are not benefiting.
"Regionalization is killing the main incentive for citizens to support levies, the knowledge of helping the children they know and love," he said.
"On the contrary, Logan county also has in place an excess levy. With well over 100 Harts students enrolled at Chapmanville Regional High School, why should the taxes from the Logan excess levy be shared with Lincoln students?" he asked.
Ramey commented, "As West Virginia ventures into the realm of dismantling viable community school systems through consolidation and regionalization, does a hidden agenda exist?"
He questioned should county officials such as County Commissioners be concerned, that ignoring efforts to thwart school regionalization, come at their own demise.
"If schools are no longer recognized in part by the county they represent, what makes County Commissioners think their institutions are safe?"
Parents faced with their children attending regional schools collectively ask, "who represents me and my children?"
If I am a Harts, Lincoln County parent, yet my child is forced to attend school in Logan County, I have nowhere to turn because voters are forced to elect school board members from the county in which they reside.
It is imperative that parents become more involved in academic discussions and decisions around their children's education.
Carving off students from the fringes of rural counties, sending them elsewhere, "Will surely destroy the viability of county school systems."
"Simply put, small children deserve to be educated in the communities where they live," Ramey concluded.
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