By PAT NEWMAN
pnewman@thecitizennews.com

Fayette County needs to build a new high school, a new middle school and five new elementary schools within the next four years to meet state-mandated class sizes and expected new student enrollments, school officials report.

If the new state guidelines for lower student-teacher ratios were mandated for the upcoming 2001 school year, there would be 1,253 elementary school students in Fayette County without a place to sit, based on the projected enrollment figures. Middle schools would be short 654 spots and the high schools would be shy 412 places.

Fortunately, Fayette County's Board of Education has until 2004 to meet the requirements outlined in House Bill 1187, better known as the governor's educational reform plan.

Members of the school board-appointed facilities advisory and action committee met last week to discuss possible options for handling the continuing growth. “The reality is, we need five elementaries in five years, a middle and high school,” Mike Satterfield, facilities director told the group.

With a tight budget ($124 million) ready for approval Friday, and no immediate plans for a bond referendum or special local option sales tax, school officials are buying time with additions at Whitewater, Booth, and Fayette middle schools, with construction scheduled to begin in the fall and repositioning portable classrooms at the most crowded facilities.

It will cost about $1.5 million locally to match the $4.5 in state growth funds earmarked for the middle school additions. The board decided to go with additions instead of building a new middle school when they were unable to come up with the $8 to $9 million needed locally to garner state funds. The additions will bring middle school capacities up to 1,100, Satterfield estimated.

Right now, the board of education has seven priorities to ease overcrowding. The first three provide 18 classrooms at each middle school, the fourth provides an eight- to 10-classroom addition at Brooks Elementary and a media center expansion.

The final three priorities call for three new 40-classroom elementary schools. Several sites are being considered for elementary schools, according to Jerry Whitaker, a school district staffer looking at possible land acquisitions. “We looked at sites on [Ga.] Highway 92 south of Fayetteville around Woolsey, another between Fayetteville and Peachtree City and a third north of Peachtree City,” he told the group.

“Large pieces of land are fast disappearing,” he added, explaining the acreage needed for new schools. An elementary school requires 20 acres, more if a sewerage system is needed; a middle school requires 30 acres and a high school 50 acres.

In the meantime, the committee will continue hashing out options such as redrawing boundary lines, adding more portable classrooms, scheduling double sessions or going to year-round school.

The next meeting tentatively scheduled for later in the summer will focus on financing options and the pluses and minuses of a sales tax versus a bond issue.