Eagle Valley rezoning OK'd by Carson City school board

The Carson City School District Board of Trustees on Tuesday voted to change the Eagle Valley Middle School attendance zone effective next fall so students promoting from or living within Fremont Elementary School’s boundaries will begin attending Eagle Valley.

After making three presentations at Eagle Valley, Carson Middle School and Fremont in February to inform parents and community members of the district’s expansion plans at Eagle Valley and expected growth coming to Carson City, Superintendent Richard Stokes brought back the item a final time to the board for action.

Carson Middle School’s capacity this school year is 1,260 students with enrollment at 1,271, while Eagle Valley’s capacity of 731 is only seeing an enrollment of 653 but is able to take on more students with land for new construction.

By school year 2024-25 without changes, CMS would see a projected enrollment of 1,436 while Eagle Valley would see an enrollment of 541. The inequities and imbalance prompted district staff to take steps to assist both schools to accommodate students at more reasonable rates that allow more quality services at both sites, better staffing, traffic reduction in the neighborhoods and ingress and egress, clear access for emergency services and less impact to families who might have children going to different schools, Stokes has stressed at the different presentations.

Stokes said variances will be granted to families of Fremont students who would like to attend Carson Middle if they already have students attending there, although transportation will not be provided and they expire at the end of each school year and must be renewed annually.

“It would not make sense for us to play hardball and not have families all go to the same school,” Stokes reported to the board in working out the variances. “So we want to assure families we will work with them and we hope, through time, all of our students who are promoting to the middle school level from Fremont go to Eagle Valley Middle School, and we believe this will benefit the school district.”

Stokes thanked the staff and principals for their help.

The board approved the modification in a 7-0 vote.