The Fayette County (W.Va.) school board has approved a facility closing and reconfiguration plan that will reduce the number of public schools in the district from 18 to 11.
The Charleston Gazette-Mail reports that the state Board of Education has to decide whether it will allow the school closings, which would leave the county with two public high schools and would close a few schools on borders with other counties.
Tuesday’s vote follows 14 public hearings over the last four weeks.
The plan calls for the district to:
- Close Ansted Middle at the end of next school year.
- Convert Midland Trail High from a ninth- through 12th-grade school into a sixth- through 12th-grade school at the end of next school year by sending Ansted Middle’s students there.
- Close Meadow Bridge High after the 2018-19 school year.
- Close Valley, Rosedale, Mount Hope, Fayetteville and Gatewood elementary schools after the 2018-19 year.
- Convert Valley High from a grade 6-to-12 school into a preK-8 school after the 2018-19 school year.
- Convert Meadow Bridge Elementary from a preK-6 school to a preK-8 school after the 2018-19 school year
- Remove fifth grade from Collins Middle, turning it into a grade 6-8 campus after the 2018-19 year.
- Turn New River Elementary from a K-4 school into a grade 3-5 school after the 2018-19 year.
- Build a new preK-2 school in Oak Hill to accept all the students in those grades from Rosedale, Mount Hope and New River elementaries after the 2018-19 school year.
- Turn Fayetteville High from a grade 7-12 school into a preK-8 school at the end of the 2018-19 school year.
The state school board has not scheduled a voted on the Fayette County closings. The president of the state school board, Tom Campbell, has opposed past plans to close Meadow Bridge High.
Six of the state board’s nine members are appointees of Gov. Jim Justice, who has spoken against consolidation.
