Bentonville School Board Weighs Transfer Requests

BENTONVILLE -- The School Board this week rejected requests from 15 students from four other districts who sought to transfer into the Bentonville School District.

The board also granted a family's request to transfer its student out of the district. That decision went against Superintendent Michael Poore's recommendation.

Poore, however, told the board he didn't object to the board's decision in that case. His recommendation was consistent with how the district has responded to similar requests in the past, he said.

"That's what we have traditionally always done," Poore said.

A past set of board members told him they didn't want to allow transfers out for financial reasons, he said. The state sends money to districts on a per-pupil basis.

All of the transfer requests the board considered were made under the Arkansas Public School Choice Act of 2013. Under that law, transfer applications must be submitted to the nonresident and resident districts by June 1 of the year in which the applicant would begin the fall semester. Districts must respond by Aug. 1.

The transfer-out case the board considered Monday involved a 6-year-old student who wanted to attend the Gravette School District. No reason was given for the transfer request. Poore said it was the first time the district had a transfer-out request since the school choice law was implemented.

The board's vote to deny the transfers in was unanimous. The vote to approve the transfer out was 4-1. Brent Leas was the only member who dissented.

"I think we could be setting a bad precedent if we allow this," Leas said. "With the overcrowding at the high school, I imagine if we let people move out, we'll lose a lot of kids."

Grant Lightle, board vice president, said he didn't think the law allowed a district to prevent a student from leaving.

"I could be wrong, but I think that's what the Legislature said. They want competition; they want kids to feel free to leave their school district as long as they're not burdening the school district they're moving to," Lightle said.

Poore said there's a place on the state transfer form requiring consent from the district a student is asking to leave.

Bentonville has a policy to deny transfers into the district if enrollment is at least 80 percent of capacity. That's the case at each of Bentonville's schools, Poore said.

The 15 students requesting to transfer into Bentonville schools included six from Gravette, five from Decatur, two from Rogers and two from Springdale. All of those districts approved allowing their students to transfer, Poore said.

The district might want to reconsider its policy on allowing students to transfer in, Lightle said.

"I just think there will come a time when we will want to receive some kids, and we'll just need to kind of think about that," Lightle said. "And I think as you see kids go to other options, we may want to just replace (them). For every kid that goes to Gravette, we'd love to have one of their kids."