Bentonville District To Present High School Plans

BENTONVILLE -- The School District plans to hold an open house next week to inform residents about progress on the second high school.

The event will be held from 6 to 8 p.m. Monday at the district's Administration Building at 500 Tiger Blvd.

There will be six stations inside the board meeting room. Each station will feature renderings of the new school, including exterior views, floor plans and the entire site plan. Visitors will be free to roam from one station to another.

Michael Poore, superintendent, will be present along with School Board members and project consultants.

"It will be real informal," said Brian Jackson, president of Hight-Jackson Associates, an architectural firm working on the project. "We'll have plenty of people in the room to answer questions and accept comments."

School District voters agreed in September to pay an additional 2.9 mills to build the second high school in Centerton. It will open in August 2016 with a capacity of 2,250 students.

Wendi Cheatham, board president, said she and fellow board members decided soon after the millage vote it would be good to host a community forum during the design process to keep the public informed.

"I don't know how many people are going to show up," she said. "I at least want to give people the opportunity to come and look at the plans."

Poore decided to call the event an open house instead of a community forum, Cheatham said. That encourages people to come and go as they wish instead of having to arrive and leave at a certain time.

Mary Ley, district communications director, said the district hosted numerous community meetings about the second high school before last year's millage vote.

"We felt like the community meetings were important to get the respect that helped us achieve the millage," Ley said. "We want to continue that."

Preliminary plans for the high school must be submitted to the Arkansas Department of Education for review by the end of this month, Jackson said.

The board received an update on the project last month. A committee of staff members, administrators, students and consultants met the past few months to help develop the design concept.

The board is expected to decide on a name, mascot and initial grade configuration for the second high school this month. A team of district administrators researched the grade configuration issue and is recommending the school open with grades nine through 11.

Another issue yet to be settled is attendance boundaries that determine which students will attend which high school. Administrators are recommending doing a study that looks at feeder patterns, economic balance and transportation costs. The study should be completed by this summer. A boundaries recommendation then would be presented to the board in September.