Charlottesville City Schools has entered the early stages of a rezoning effort for its six elementary schools, a response to already increasing enrollment and the prospect of even more with new city policies encouraging denser development.
The school division is also getting closer to determining the new names for its four remaining elementary schools under review, after unveiling the new names of two others earlier this year.
“The goal of rezoning is to prevent school overcrowding,” the school division said in a recent statement, which noted that this is the first comprehensive rezoning conversation in Charlottesville since Jackson-Via Elementary School was built in 1969.
The process began over the summer, when the school board engaged an outside consulting firm to review the current elementary school zones and make recommendations that would roughly align with Charlottesville’s loosely drawn neighborhood boundaries. Other priorities for the rezoning effort include maximizing walkability, bus route efficiency, “diversity and demographic balance across schools” as well as sustainability to prevent future rezoning for at least another five years.
Next steps will focus on presenting the work done up to this point to the community and creating space for local input. Over the coming weeks, the school division is holding five discussions to provide a chance for community members to learn more about and become a part of the process.
Discussions will be held:
From 5 to 7 p.m. Oct. 28 at Greenbrier Elementary School.From 4 to 6 p.m. Oct. 29 at Jackson-Via Elementary School.From 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Oct. 30 at Summit Elementary School.And from noon to 1:30 p.m. and 6 to 7:30 p.m. Nov. 6 via Zoom. Registration for the Zoom discussion will be made available on the Charlottesville City Schools website.
While the connection between the city’s recent rezoning ordinance and its elementary schools may not initially be clear to some, the new policies meant to encourage greater density in the city — in addition to the University of Virginia’s decision to require all second-year students to live on Grounds — played a role in bringing about the school rezoning conversation, according to the school division.
With the potential for greater density, and therefore more people, living within city limits, Charlottesville City Schools says it anticipates an uptick in enrollment in the coming years.
In addition, the city’s redevelopment of the public housing at South First Street also is a factor. With 175 affordable apartments and townhouses coming online at South First Street in the coming school year, the city’s schools are working to get out ahead of potentially congested classrooms.
“Rezoning would enable the division to avoid overcrowding issues or the need to install learning cottages at some elementary schools,” according to the school division.
Following the community engagement period this fall, school board members will make a decision on elementary school rezoning based on public input and the consulting firm’s recommendations. That decision is expected to come down in February of next year. The implementation of those plans, however, won’t take place until August of 2026, which the school division says will “coincide with the return of fifth graders to elementary schools.”
“There are different approaches to rezoning implementation, including some phased approaches,” reads the school division’s statement. “The consultant would also make a recommendation about how to implement the new zones.”
Different zoning districts is not the only change that may soon be coming to the city’s elementary schools. The school division has also restarted its school renaming project, forming four committees to review whether the namesakes of Greenbrier and Jackson-Via elementary schools “are in alignment with the community’s current values.” A survey remains open on the Charlottesville City Schools’ website where anyone can offer feedback on what to name the schools.
The remaining four elementary schools will all see their names changed, if they haven’t already. Beginning this school year, Clark Elementary School became Summit, a nod to the nearby Blue Ridge Mountains, and Venable Elementary School was renamed Trailblazer, honoring the Charlottesville 12, the first local schoolchildren to desegregate the city’s schools.
Clark was named for George Rogers Clark, a Revolutionary War general born in Albemarle County and nicknamed the “Conqueror of the Old Northwest.” Clark, the man, was a celebrated hero in his day, but his legacy has depreciated over the years, specifically his violent treatment of Native Americans during the war.
Venable, on the other hand, was named for Charles S. Venable, a Confederate officer and aide-de-camp to Gen. Robert E. Lee. A mathematician and astronomer by trade, he served as a professor at UVa and a city school board member after the war. So loyal was Venable to Lee, Venable was given the nickname “Faithful Old Venable.”
Back in April 2023, Charlottesville School Board determined that Burnley-Moran and Johnson elementary schools must also change their names due to their namesakes’ work under state-mandate segregation. Carrie Burnley and Sarepta Moran were both principals in Charlottesville schools, among the first of their gender to attain the status. James Johnson served as superintendent of city schools for 36 years. The school division has yet to land on new names, however, after pushback to early suggestions.
A virtual forum was held on the evening of Oct. 14, during which roughly 25 parents and other community members took advantage of the opportunity to pose queries, comments and concerns to school division staff and school board members regarding the renaming process.
Several community members inquired about the committee procedure, how the new names would ultimately be determined and the associated costs. School division spokeswoman Beth Cheuk answered that last question, saying the estimate has come out to about $30,000.
While the school board has said the decision to rename Burnley-Moran and Johnson elementary schools has been finalized, Charlottesville resident and great-nephew of one half of Burnely-Moran’s namesakes, Chuck Moran, pressed school officials on the verdict. During the virtual forum, he pointed out that the namesakes of other schools that came up earlier in the process underwent a different level of scrutiny than the ones currently under assessment: Greenbrier and Jackson-Via.
“My feeling is that if those people, Burnley, Moran and Johnson, were teaching during segregation, so were Jackson and Via, and it seems like a major injustice to apply the segregation label because of the accident of someone’s birth and the jobs that they were able to get during their teaching time,” said Chuck Moran during the forum’s discussion period.
Via was also a principal at Charlottesville schools as well as a children’s book author. Nannie Cox Jackson was one of Charlottesville’s leading Black educators who organized the first football team in the city school division and encouraged boys to take practical courses, such as cooking and sewing, long relegated to girls’ studies.
“Betty Davis Via was able to teach both during integration and segregation, but everybody else taught during segregation, so if that’s the marker, then it seems to me it needs to be applied equally across it,” he continued.
Cheuk’s response noted that the educators, aside from Via and Nanny Cox Jackson, were involved in “White-segregated schools” with no evidence indicating that they actively worked toward desegregation.
“The public feedback in the committee’s decision recognized that regardless of the accomplishment or merit of these individuals, these school names commemorate an era of segregated education that no longer reflects the division’s values,” she said.
The four school renaming committees have already begun meeting regularly and will make their recommendations to Superintendent Royal Gurley, who will then submit his thoughts to the school board for a final vote. If the process is completed by late winter or early spring, the new names could go into effect as early as August 2025, according to the school division.
Source: www.dailyprogress.com
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