School Consolidation on Path to Success
We did it! It’s official! Our community has come together on a plan for consolidation of our city and county schools, and that plan is now a law. This achievement is a cause for great celebration!
On April 24, the governor signed a bill that will create the Starkville-Oktibbeha Consolidated School District in the 2015-16 school year. The law incorporated the recommendations of the Commission on Starkville Consolidated School District Structure. The commission was set up to allow local leaders to have input regarding how the two districts could come together in a way that strengthens both.
School consolidation has been a long time coming, and frankly, many thought this day might never come. Several excellent attempts in the past by visionary leaders ended in failure. Ever since the county school district lines were drawn, resembling a donut with Starkville in the middle, the county has been at a disadvantage. The city district extends beyond the city limits and includes much of the wealth in our county. The county district was left with a higher percentage of children in poverty and fewer resources to educate them.
The obvious solution was consolidation, but that solution was not simple to achieve. Mississippi’s twin bugaboos of race and poverty contributed to a climate of fear and mistrust over many decades. As a result, a number of county and city leaders resisted previous efforts, each for their own reasons. Meanwhile, the gap in educational opportunities for children widened.
Enter two unlikely actors: State Senator Gray Tollison of Oxford and State Representative Toby Barker from Hattiesburg. Since the Oktibbeha County School District was in conservatorship for a second time, and its school board had been disbanded, these two advocates for public education in the state legislature saw an opportunity. In 2013, they secured passage of a law to begin the consolidation process.
In the 1980s, Tollison worked on the staff of Senator John C. Stennis, when Rex Buffington was a senior aide to Senator Stennis. Responding to the consolidation bill, Buffington quickly assembled an informal working group on consolidation with representatives from the Starkville School District, Mississippi State University, Parents for Public Schools, Starkville Foundation for Public Education, Parent Teacher Organizations, the Greater Starkville Development Partnership and others.
This group, led by Buffington, successfully lobbied Tollison and Barker to form a commission to make recommendations. The legislature was open to a commission because for the first time, a larger award-winning district would be consolidating with a smaller district that was under conservatorship.
The result is terrific! Pre-K is on the way, and we will eventually have a new school building on the campus of Mississippi State University, which as an institution will be more involved in local education than ever before. Many local citizens have had a hand in this success: Lee Brand, Devon Brenner, Nelle Cohen, Jeremiah Dumas, Jennifer Gregory, Lewis Holloway, Michelle Jones, Haley Montgomery, Margie Pulley, David Shaw, Anne Stricklin, Nicole Thomas, John Tomlinson, Orlando Trainer and many others.
Thanks to a locally-derived plan that now has the support of the state, the new consolidated district will be stronger than any district in our area’s history. We live in a great place with a strong public school system, and it’s about to get better.
Brother Rogers is a guest columnist for the Starkville Daily News and works at the Stennis Center for Public Service.
On April 24, the governor signed a bill that will create the Starkville-Oktibbeha Consolidated School District in the 2015-16 school year. The law incorporated the recommendations of the Commission on Starkville Consolidated School District Structure. The commission was set up to allow local leaders to have input regarding how the two districts could come together in a way that strengthens both.
School consolidation has been a long time coming, and frankly, many thought this day might never come. Several excellent attempts in the past by visionary leaders ended in failure. Ever since the county school district lines were drawn, resembling a donut with Starkville in the middle, the county has been at a disadvantage. The city district extends beyond the city limits and includes much of the wealth in our county. The county district was left with a higher percentage of children in poverty and fewer resources to educate them.
The obvious solution was consolidation, but that solution was not simple to achieve. Mississippi’s twin bugaboos of race and poverty contributed to a climate of fear and mistrust over many decades. As a result, a number of county and city leaders resisted previous efforts, each for their own reasons. Meanwhile, the gap in educational opportunities for children widened.
Enter two unlikely actors: State Senator Gray Tollison of Oxford and State Representative Toby Barker from Hattiesburg. Since the Oktibbeha County School District was in conservatorship for a second time, and its school board had been disbanded, these two advocates for public education in the state legislature saw an opportunity. In 2013, they secured passage of a law to begin the consolidation process.
In the 1980s, Tollison worked on the staff of Senator John C. Stennis, when Rex Buffington was a senior aide to Senator Stennis. Responding to the consolidation bill, Buffington quickly assembled an informal working group on consolidation with representatives from the Starkville School District, Mississippi State University, Parents for Public Schools, Starkville Foundation for Public Education, Parent Teacher Organizations, the Greater Starkville Development Partnership and others.
This group, led by Buffington, successfully lobbied Tollison and Barker to form a commission to make recommendations. The legislature was open to a commission because for the first time, a larger award-winning district would be consolidating with a smaller district that was under conservatorship.
The result is terrific! Pre-K is on the way, and we will eventually have a new school building on the campus of Mississippi State University, which as an institution will be more involved in local education than ever before. Many local citizens have had a hand in this success: Lee Brand, Devon Brenner, Nelle Cohen, Jeremiah Dumas, Jennifer Gregory, Lewis Holloway, Michelle Jones, Haley Montgomery, Margie Pulley, David Shaw, Anne Stricklin, Nicole Thomas, John Tomlinson, Orlando Trainer and many others.
Thanks to a locally-derived plan that now has the support of the state, the new consolidated district will be stronger than any district in our area’s history. We live in a great place with a strong public school system, and it’s about to get better.
Brother Rogers is a guest columnist for the Starkville Daily News and works at the Stennis Center for Public Service.