Richland 2 rezones elementary school boundaries in Blythewood area
Elementary school students in some Blythewood neighborhoods will be attending a new school next year.
Tuesday, the Richland 2 school board unanimously approved re-zoning Blythewood Crossing, Blythewood Crossing Apartments, Summer Pines Subdivision, Windfall Subdivision and North Pines Subdivision from Bethel-Hanberry Elementary to Langford Elementary.
Hunters Run, Crickentree Subdivision and Baymont Subdivision will be rezoned from Langford Elementary to lower and upper Lake Carolina. And The Falls will be rezoned from Round Top to upper and lower Lake Carolina, according to board documents.
The re-zoning will be effective starting in the 2022-2023 school year.
The rezoning attempts to alleviate overcrowding at Bethel-Hanberry. Bethel-Hanberry currently has around 821 students, but capacity for only 700, according to board documents. In contrast, Langford Elementary has just under 500 students, but a capacity of 747. Both Lake Carolina schools also have room for more than 250 more students each.
“This is one of the toughest decisions I’ve made as a board member, that we make as a board,” Richland 2 Vice Chair James Manning said during the Tuesday meeting. “It is very disruptive to families. They buy a home with the intent their child will go to the schools that they’re zoned for and we come back afterwards and we change that and that is very disruptive. And that is difficult.”
The overcrowding at Bethel-Hanberry reflects an increase of growth in the Blythewood area, Superintendent Baron Davis said during the meeting.
“It was our intent to not kick the can down the road, but to address this now because we know growth is continuing to show in the Richland 2 community, which is a positive thing,” Davis said. “People want to have their students educated in our school district and that is evident by the development in our community, because we have excellent leaders and excellent schools.”
This story was originally published October 29, 2021 at 2:06 PM.