At this time boundary lines are being redrawn for all West Fargo Public Elementary Schools. Pursuant to the current proposal, students from the neighborhood of Shadow Wood (South of 32nd Ave, East of 4th St E and North of 40th Ave S) will no longer be in the Freedom Elementary school boundaries, but will begin attending Independence Elementary.
We feel that this is not an equitable exchange. All West Fargo schools receive the same baseline educational services for students requiring extra assistance UNLESS a school qualifies as a Title One school, a decision based solely on the number of students receiving Free or Reduced Lunch.
With the current proposed boundary lines Freedom Elementary will go from 29.47% Free and Reduced to 32.5%. Independence Elementary will go from33.3% down to 15%. This will greatly benefit the students of Independence Elementary while pushing Freedom Elementary to a point where it should receive extra assistance, but will not according to current district standards.
We are proposing a new boundary revision. In this scenario, portions of rental communities East of Veterans Blvd (Specifically the Amber Valley Community with the exception of the neighborhood North of 28th Ave S and West of 51st St S) would begin attending Independence Elementary and the Shadow Wood Community would remain at Freedom Elementary. According to present data, this would allow the number of Free and Reduced Lunch students at both Freedom and Independence to drop well below the district average of 31.5%, while maintaining a total student population well below the district preferred 530 students. Neither school will qualify for Title One Services, but both will have a much more manageable and equitable number of students to serve.
