Lapham School and Marquette School are paired right now. Kids on the north and south sides of the Isthmus attend Lapham from Kindergarten to second grade, Marquette from third to fifth grade, and then O'Keeffe from sixth to eighth grade.
There may be other reasons to oppose consolidating Lapham and Marquette, but from the standpoint of walking to school, the change is basically a wash; while a kid who lives on Jenifer Street will have to cross E. Washington Avenue for all six years of grade school (not just for K-2), a kid on E. Dayton Street will stay in his/her neighborhood until middle school. I hesitate to make a constructive suggestion right now, but this might be a good time to look for creative ways to encourage parents to let Marquette neighborhood students walk to Lapham; after all, the distance is not too bad for most kids in the neighborhood, even if the street crossings are terrifying. Perhaps this would be a good occasion to introduce the "Walking School Bus" (http://www.lesstraffic.com/Programs/WB/WB.htm) into Madison. I'm not happy to see the cuts that were made, but we have to remember that state law requires these cuts, and the School Board's job is to do the least amount of harm to the schools while cutting the budget. For the people who think we should keep Marquette open at all costs, I think it's fair to ask: what should we cut instead? Paul T. O'Leary wrote: > Get ready to wrestle with more deathmobiles if you live anywhere near > Lapham School. Last night the School Board voted to close Marquette > Elementary School, and transfer its students to Lapham. This means former > Marquette students will be crossing E. Washington Ave, and some will be > crossing BOTH E. Wash and Willy St. > > The whole skinny: > http://www.madison.com/wsj/mad/top/index.php?ntid=131774&ntpid=1 > --------------- > Paul T. O'Leary > Desktop Insurgent > Madison, WI USA > > _______________________________________________ > Bikies mailing list > [email protected] > http://www.danenet.org/mailman/listinfo/bikies > > _______________________________________________ Bikies mailing list [email protected] http://www.danenet.org/mailman/listinfo/bikies
