Open enroll at Lakota Local Schools
Where: Lakota Enrollment Center, located at 8735 Cincinnati-Dayton Road, West Chester
When: From 7:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Friday. The office is closed Aug. 1, Aug. 8 and Aug. 15 in order to process enrollment.
Evening hours: From 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. July 31, Aug. 7 and Aug. 14
Deadline: Aug. 3; students to be notified by Aug. 10
More info: www.lakotaonline.com
Open enrollment for students living outside the district is underway at Lakota — a first for the school district of about 18,000 students.
School board members approved an inter-district open enrollment policy June 25, and the process opened July 17. Families have until Aug. 3 to submit an application and will be notified by Aug. 10.
Kim McGowan, enrollment services coordinator, said the interest has been “reasonable” since the process opened July 17. She said in the first week about a dozen families applied.
“They’re not flooding the gates yet,” McGowan said.
The district has already had an intra-district open enrollment policy — for moving among the 22 school buildings — which was originally adopted in 1982. The school board approved updated language of its intra-district policy July 17 to better align with the inter-district guidelines, said Jenni Logan, Lakota’s treasurer.
McGowan said per the open enrollment guidelines, there are three priorities given during open enrollment. The first priority is given to students who have open enrolled in the past. This won’t become relevant until at least the second year of the inter-district open enrollment, McGowan said.
Second priority is for staff members living outside the district that wish to enroll their child. Lastly, a third priority is given to children who have siblings inside the district
“After that it’s by date and time,” McGowan said, with final approval by the superintendent.
The Ross Local School District remains the only district — of 10 school districts in Butler County — to not offer open enrollment.Fairfield City Schools most recently approved a policy in April to allow open enrollment for students outside the district.
Logan said a cap for the number of students open enrolling won’t be set until the end of July. She said the final number will be dependent on class- and building-size restrictions.
“We’re trying to look at what the need is,” Logan said. “Where we have holes, we will fill.”
Families wishing to apply for open enrollment can visit the Lakota Enrollment Center, located at 8735 Cincinnati-Dayton Road in West Chester, from 7:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Friday. The office will be closed Aug. 1, Aug. 8 and Aug. 15 in order to process enrollment.
The office is offering evening hours from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. July 31, Aug. 7 and Aug. 14.
Logan said the district won’t see any added expenses by offering inter-district open enrollment. Lakota will receive from the Ohio Department of Education about $5,700 per student that open enrolls from outside the district.
Logan said typically the state reduces that rate to about $2,200 per student when the pupil lives within the district and supports the school’s tax base.
“We’re not increasing expenses because we’re not adding staff,” Logan said. “We won’t add too many kids that we have to add staff.”
Logan said 75 students left the district during the 2011-12 school year. Over the past two years, Logan said enrollment has decreased by 700 students.
“It’s a creative way to attack the bottom line,” Logan said of open enrollment.
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