by ClassBEast » Mon Sep 22, 2008 10:40 pm
It looks like West Fargo is thinking about adding another one too...
A second WF high school?
Kelly Smith, The Forum
Published Monday, September 22, 2008
Traci Weible knows the winds of change are blowing into West Fargo. And it’s leaving her and other long-term, Packer-backing residents torn.
“I would hate to see the town divided by separate high schools,” Weible said, adding that both she and her husband grew up and graduated as Packers, and look forward to their three children graduating from the high school.
“I just don’t want that separation,” she said. “I want it to be one high school.”
But with the city’s ballooning population shaking the seams of schools faster than anyone predicted, Weible and others are forced to grapple with the idea of a second high school.
And that growing acceptance of a second high school is one School Board members think may allow them to move forward with plans for one or more referendums in the next year.
“It’s going to be a sell,” West Fargo High School Principal Gary Clark said.
Of anyone, Clark – wearing a green “WF Packers” polo – understands the importance of backing the Packers, but also the strains of the growing community on school space.
“I think the younger people just moving in will be more open to it,” he said.
It’s those newer, younger residents not as tied to Packer pride that may be the support the district needs to pass an eventual referendum for a new high school.
Like Kevin Carpenter, who’s lived in Eagle Run for two and a half years and has three children in the district.
“We don’t have that Packer pride,” he said. “It wouldn’t be an issue.”
Or there’s Kelly Duchscherer, who has plenty of pride for West Fargo but, with young children, isn’t as immersed in Packer spirit.
“It’s more about the education,” the Eagle Run resident said.
Long-term residents like Pam Kloos won’t disagree with that. The vice president of the Packer Backers – a fund-raising group for Packer activities – acknowledges a second school is inevitable. She just hopes the small-town atmosphere doesn’t change.
“(The city) will have to figure out how to keep West Fargo, West Fargo,” she said.
Maintaining that unity is a task the School Board faces in the next four to five months.
While talks of a referendum are preliminary, Superintendent Dana Diesel Wallace said the board will sort through possible solutions to the district’s space crunch and have a plan by March or April.
Just last month, the board nixed a fall referendum citing the economy and the lack of public support. Yet they’re optimistic the community’s views are quickly changing.
“When we opened up that dialogue (three years ago), it sent shivers down people’s backs because they didn’t want the community to change,” board President Tom Gentzkow said. “Is the time right, now? I think people are more receptive to it. We’ll let the public tell.”
The last bond referendum in West Fargo was in 2005 for the Ninth Grade Center and Aurora Elementary. Both that referendum and another in 2002 for Cheney Middle School were widely supported by voters, Gentzkow said. Three years later, the district is still growing.
As board member Karen Nitzkorski told her cohorts last week: “I think we’re ripe for a new high school.”
Now, they just need to gauge if the next year is the right season to replant the idea in residents’ minds.
“People are starting to realize they need to do something,” high school Assistant Principal Cory Steiner said. “We have to reframe how we think about the community.”
Readers can reach Forum reporter Kelly Smith at (701) 241-5515