Katy schools look to bonds

The school year had just started at Memorial Parkway Elementary School off Mason Road in Katy Indepndent School District when leaky pipes and HVAC problems struck.

With 870 students enrolled this year, the building is strained - 130 students over capacity.

"We're not what you call a growing school," Troy Kemp, principal of the school for 14 years, told a small group of reporters gathered to tour the school. But with a number of programs, particularly the auditory impaired program, that draw students from other schools both inside and outside of the district, the demands on the campus, built in 1978, are high.

Katy ISD is considered a fast-growing district, adding some 3,000 new students each year. Nearly half of the district's $748 million bond on the ballot this November would go for six new schools to keep up with the growth.

The next biggest item on the bond is a set of comprehensive renovations for six existing campuses, valued at $135 million. Another $42 million would go toward smaller spot projects at a number of schools. And nearly $37 million would provide for expansions of some of the district's junior high and high schools as well as its career and technology center.

Kemp's school is one of the six that would benefit from renovation should the bond pass.

In the meantime, the school manages.

"For the last three years, every year we have had to add classrooms," said Kemp. The school has 10 portable buildings sitting out back, each split into two classrooms. Kemp calls them their "village of learning cottages." Though the rooms come equipped with all the latest technology, including free-standing smart boards, bathroom breaks can be complicated. "It's just the logistics of being outside," explained Kemp. All the doors on the main building are kept locked and students can't walk to the building unsupervised.

Inside the main building, several kindergarten and pre-kindergarten classes share an awkwardly laid out "open-concept" classroom, which can get a little loud at times. "They do the best they can not to disrupt each other," said Kemp.

'Time to renovate'

Reconfiguring that space and adding more classrooms to replace the portables are two of the bigger items on Kemp's wish list. But the more than $15 million allotted for the school's renovation would also allow for significant upgrades, like new floors in the gym that won't be so slick, plumbing improvements to replace corroded, galvanized pipes and expanded clinic space for the roughly 50 kids who come through the nurse's office every day for everything from medications to fevers.

Right now, the tiny office has three cots and no way to separate them. "It's a pretty busy place," said Martha Barbier, a registered nurse who works with a part-time aid. "If they have a headache, sometimes they have to go back a little faster because I have somebody who has a fever."

The campus had its last major renovation in 1994.

"It's time," said bond committee member and parent Shani Matheson, standing in the lobby of Memorial Parkway Elementary School."It's just time to renovate."

Three other elementary schools, one junior high and one high school would also receive renovations similar to Memorial Parkway's plans. Smaller projects like waterproofing, replacing old carpet and updating fire alarms are planned for more than 40 other campuses.

Other campuses in the district, like Morton Ranch High School, would also benefit as new schools are built. That campus is some 400 students over capacity, with 32 classes held in portable buildings outside.

The new schools in the bond, including a high school that would open in 2017, could help alleviate some of the crowding that fills the high school's two cafeteria's when the lunch shifts start at 10:15 a.m.

"Crowded hallways are the norm during passing periods," principal Lee Crews told the school board at a recent workshop. "In our hallways you take it slow whether you like it or not."

Managing growth

Lunch starts even earlier at WoodCreek Junior High School, where the first group of kids heads to the cafeteria at 9:55 a.m. With 34 classrooms outside in portables and packed hallways inside, the school went to a two-bell schedule this year, staggering class changes across the campus.

"It really alleviated the stress," said Kerri Finnesand, principal at the 1,900-student school.

"We manage the growth," Finnesand told the board at the same workshop, "but we are definitely looking forward to having some new plans in the future."