Middle school could help with overflow

By MARK WAITE

VIEW STAFF WRITER

The current Rosemary Clarke Middle School could be used to house elementary school pupils when the new middle school opens next fall.

The middle school will be used for one year to house younger pupils in grades K-5 while an 80-acre site is being developed for a new elementary school on the far south end of the Pahrump Valley. Interim Superintendent Harold Tokerud suggested the one-year plan to Nye County School District trustees last Tuesday at the Pahrump District office.

The school district has asked the U.S. Bureau of Land Management for 80 acres at the corner of Kellogg and Hafen Ranch Road to build a new elementary school, based on a suggestion first raised by developer Tim Hafen in 1998. The extra space would allow the district to go back to a traditional school calendar, he said.

Tokerud told the school board some elementary school classes have 34 to 36 students in a 900-square-foot classroom. The elementary schools are filled to the seams, he said.

"Take a new look at what you're going to do with the old middle school and the best option that came forth was we would make that an elementary building next year," Tokerud said. "Southern area (elementary) pupils would be bused into the middle school next year, then the following year, we would put them in 80 acres down south in a new elementary building."

Student enrollment figures on count day late last month, showed Manse Elementary had 446 students in 18 classrooms, down from 454 students in September 1999; J.G. Johnson had 733 students in 23 classrooms, up from 721 students last year and Mt. Charleston Elementary had 625 students in 28 classrooms, up from 603 in September 1999.

Tokerud noted the enrollment figures have flattened out. But he said, "This might be the time to eliminate year-round schooling in Pahrump Valley."

Opening up the old middle school could lower Manse's enrollment to 354 students, J.G. Johnson to 418 students and Mt. Charleston to 445 students, Tokerud said.

Upper grades also saw a reduction in attendance figures this year, Rosemary Clarke Middle School enrollment dropped from 890 to 884 students, Pahrump Valley High School saw a decline from 1,041 to 1,006.

The high school should see some relief from overcrowding when the High Tech Center opens in fall 2001 with 10 to 11 new classes, Tokerud said.

While there will be minimal changes required to convert the middle school to an elementary, Tokerud said the board will have to make decisions on redrawing school zones, have discussions with unions, plan bus routes and draw up the school calendar.

Only the high school students currently attend school on a traditional calendar. Pupils at the three elementaries and middle school students attend school on one of four year-round tracks.

"That year-round calendar worked because if you wouldn't have had it, I don't know how you would've run these schools," said Tokerud, who was formerly superintendent of Esmeralda County School District. He said year-round school is in its fourth year of what was supposed to be a two-year plan.

The district could save money in busing costs and contracted services now paid out during the longer school year, Tokerud said. The only respite from school is a three-week period during August, when all four tracks are on vacation.

The new middle school, which will include three buildings of 12 classrooms each, a cafeteria, media center and administration building, is scheduled to open in September 2001, on Simkins and Blagg roads.

A new 80-acre elementary school site would allow future development for a middle school or high school on the property if necessary, Tokerud said. School officials wrote a letter to Hafen asking about the cost of hookups to nearby utilities.

The school board had been considering acquiring, from the BLM, a smaller 26-acre site on Gamebird road, just west of Pahrump Valley Boulevard, across from Our Lady of the Valley Catholic Church, but it would be 6,600 feet from utility lines and cost $165,000 to connect water lines, Michael Johnson, general manager of Central Nevada Utilities said in an Oct. 3 letter. The company also suggested the school district come up with a design for sewer service.

School officials plan to use the same architect to design the new elementary school, PSWC, that designed the J.G. Johnson Elementary School. Conceptual drawings will be considered at a school board meeting next month. Maintenance and Operations Supervisor Don Brod said school officials like the design at J.G. Johnson. Tokerud said the architect has suggested a fee of 6.9 percent of the construction cost for drawing up the plans, which he said is less than the 8 percent to 10 percent charged in Clark County.

The new elementary school could cost $7.5 million and be ready by September 2002. Nye County School District Budget Director Bill Merrell said the district will have $10 million to use in bond money this coming January.

"Board members think we should start looking at community schools and away from the centralized schools like we have now," Brod said, "where students could maybe walk to school instead of using buses."

Currently the site is at the southern end of development in the Pahrump Valley, where Hafen Ranch Road turns into gravel. It lies just south of Hafen's Artesia subdivision and about two miles south of the proposed 8,300-home Mountain Falls development by E.A. Collins Development Corp.

Brod noted Collins has set aside 20 acres for a middle school and 10 acres for an elementary school in his master plan, but added that wouldn't be provided unless there are over 700 homes built.

"We're pushing the threshold. I do believe, even with the lack of growth we showed this year on count day, we still need more classrooms," Brod said.