Summer break is highly anticipated by most students who are ready to escape the drudgery of homework, getting up early and sitting in classrooms, but for students at one Oceanside school, the beginning of summer break is the beginning of the end.
Reynolds Elementary School is closing for good after the Oceanside Unified School District decided to scrap plans to remodel the school over concerns that the ground beneath it is unstable and might collapse during an earthquake.
Parents disputed the rationale, but the closure is moving forward. June 15 will be the last day of classes.
“We still get emotional talking about it,” said PTO president Julie Hammer, her 3rd-grade daughter, Mila, by her side. “It’s really hard. We’re trying to focus on anything positive that we can because it’s devastating, it really is.”
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Hammer and other PTO members are now trying to turn an uncertain future into a hopeful one for their children and their teachers. All of them will land in different schools next year.
Some still don’t know what schools they’ll be attending. The district has re-drawn school boundary lines, sending most students to either Libby or Del Rio Elementary School. Students in the bilingual immersion program will attend Foussut Elementary, but many parents have asked the district for waivers to send their children elsewhere.
Hammer said most of those requests have gone unanswered by the district, except for those parents who asked to take their children to a different school district. Hammer said those requests have been denied.
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On Tuesday, the district answered NBC 7's questions about school and district transfer requests. The district said two of three students asking for a transfer out of Oceanside Unified were granted transfers, and said 145 of 146 students asking to attend a school other than what they were assigned were reassigned to one of their top-two choices.
