A law requiring Kansas public school districts to enroll any students, even if they don’t live inside the district’s boundaries, will go into effect before the start of next school year in 2024.
But already, school board members in USD 232 in De Soto are expressing frustration and skepticism as the district prepares new rules to comply with the law and anticipates a potential influx of new students.
The USD 232 school board on Monday, it is set to discuss a draft open enrollment plan for accepting nonresident students. As part of that discussion, the board will vote on scheduling a public hearing on the policy later this year.
The law allows students to attend any public school in the state
The current discussion is the result of the Kansas Legislature last year passing House Bill 2567, which was later signed into law by Gov. Laura Kelly.
The law allows for Kansas students to enroll in any public school district, provided there is space available.
In turn, the law requires public school districts to develop plans for enrolling nonresident students and setting standards for how many out-of-district students they can accept and how that will be determined.
Other Johnson County school district leaders, including those in Blue Valley and Olathe, have criticized the law, calling it a “logistical nightmare.”
Republican lawmakers who backed the bill cast it as a way to give families and students more power over their education.
USD 232 has drafted an open enrollment plan
Under a draft plan, enrollment capacity in kindergarten through 8th grade will be determined by student-teacher ratio in each grade at each school.
For high school, capacity will be determined by student-teacher ratio for each building.
“Think of it as available slots, if you will, or seats for students that are nonresidents,” Assistant Superintendent Alvie Cater said that to the board during a meeting Sept. 11.
The draft plan includes a timeline for students to apply
The draft plan says that on June 1 prior to the 2024-25 year, the district would announce the number of open seats each grade has at each building.
Then, from June 1 to June 30, nonresident students could apply to enroll in USD 232.
If the number of applications is equal to or less than the number of open seats, all nonresident applicants would be accepted.
If the number of applications exceeds a school’s capacity, the district would use a lottery process to randomly choose nonresident students to fill the available slots.
When speaking to the board Sept. 11, Cater noted that under the draft plan, nonresident students can be denied enrollment only if there is no capacity and they are not selected in the lottery.
Some board members criticized open enrollment
Some board members said exceeding the district’s current capacity remains their main concern with implementing open enrollment.
“I think the harder work is determining capacity in the spring and being prepared to get pushback,” said Superintendent Cory Gibson, referring to nonresident families trying to enroll their students in USD 232.
Gibson added that the district right now gets “numerous” calls from nonresident families asking how they can enroll their child in USD 232.
“Well right now, you’ve got to move here or come work for us or bring your child,” Gibson said. “[Open enrollment] might be one of those things that could get sticky for us.”
In response, some board members called it “an administrative challenge” and “a planning nightmare.” One also expressed concern that open enrollment policies would simply be used as a recruiting tool for athletes.
Board member Bill Fletcher was particularly critical of the new law.
“What buffoons in Topeka proposed this idea?” he said. “[Taxpayers] paid for all this and now we’ve got to bring people in from the outside. If we have another growth experience then we’re going to have to pay for another bond issue to build new schools for them. This is completely wrong.”
Fletcher suggested USD 232 team up with neighboring Johnson County school districts to file a class action lawsuit to “put an end to this stupidity,” but other board members said at this point that would not be the best course of action.
What’s next
During its Oct. 2 meeting, the board will be presented with a draft open enrollment policy and will be able to discuss it, ask questions and give feedback.
As part of that discussion, the board will vote to set a public hearing date for its draft open enrollment policy.
Go deeper: Read the full agenda about the Board of Education meeting
