Just remember, the reason why Bubb and Huff have students from "across town" is because MVWSD chose to close Slater School-we don't have another school in our neighborhood, so we have to go somewhere....there are some of us at EVERY school in town. We were told it would be a good thing to bus students to Bubb and Huff, because it would increase diversity which in turn would increase academic achievement which was the "overarching goal" of choosing which school to close. MVWSD should seriously consider taking back the old Whisman school site in 2011 when it has the chance... and then Bubb and Huff can have their schools back.

It seems like the best decision is to re-open slater to relieve the overcrowding. I am surprised if the district didnt do the proper forecasting or trending when they made the decision to close it. Also, with the new housing development on Miramonte near el camino, that would create additional potential students into the bubb district. I am a little concerned since my daughter will start at bubb next year i expect, so perhaps we will have to fill out forms extra early to get a spot within our own district.

I'm sure those of us who fought to keep ALL schools open when the council first decided to close Slater feel very frustrated right now. Slater parents provided researching that showed that the enrollment projections used to justify closing a school were questionable.

Happily, the closure of Slater forced my family to look at ALL school options in Mountain View, and we are thrilled with the community and education we have at St. Joseph's. Recalling the struggle we put up to keep Slater open, and now seeing our research validated, I remember why we decided to leave the public school system altogether: the school board in Mountain View Whisman is disfunctional and incapable of making reasonable decisions for the good of the school community.

Rodney,
We can't reopen Slater because we gave it to Google(or they took it from us ) and they have completely transformed it into a childcare site for little googleites.
I don't believe we will EVER see Slater School reopen(very sad). However we have another public school over here called Whisman which is a beautiful campus located right in the heart of the North Whisman neighborhood. It is currently rented out to the German School(since 1999), but comes up for lease review for 2011. This would be a smart move on the district's part.

Well, I guess it's too late to say "we told you so" but Slater Parents did do their research (better than the district) and showed that enrollment would increase. It increased within the first year of the closure.
""...which came as a huge surprise," director of administrative services Stephanie Totter said""
uhmm,well no, not really!

Why do you all think this is because of the closure of Slater? There are relatively few students from the Slater neighborhood attending Huff or Bubb. While other neighborhoods have increased their student populations, the Slater neighborhood student population has actually gone down, due in part to the closure of the large apartment complex at Whisman and Evandale. The greatest growth has occurred at Moffett and the other side of the Central Expressway.

The Slater was addressing the district's overall enrollment projections which were used to justify closing a school. They had already made up their mind to close Slater, but we focussed our efforts on showing them that they needed ALL schools open.

It went something like this:
District: we have falling enrollments so must close a school. Let's close Slater.
Slater: Your figures are wrong, enrollments will rise and you will have overcrowding if you close ANY school.
District: no, we're right, sorry.

Fast-forward 3 years:
District: where did all these students come from?

The whole notion of a neighborhood school is a pipe dream. The district is more concerned with busing and moving around low-income minority students so they are not concentrated in any one school where they will drive down test scores. Go private school like we did, you won't be dissappointed.

Lots of people paid premium to move into a good school neighborhood. Cupertino is one of the example. The point is that let's not constantly change the boundries to scare away people who would sacrify more for their kids. Good parents are one of the determining factors for great school.

Low income neigborhood school needs to require more parent participation in school. Parents needs to be busy supporting their kids instead of being irresponsible. No offense, being a property manager, I've seen lots of low income family kids running loose on the street while their parents were too busy drinking, smoking and watching TV the same time. I really don't want to see mountain view turning into a slump.

Good point CC and I agree with Ned. Go the private school route, just like the Obama's will despite all that talk about hope, real change, and personal sacrifice. Yeah right, as long as it is not the person saying it!