SD 214

[admin]

Someone wanted me repost this

District Enrollment* 1922 Arlington High School 101
1928 Arlington High School Addition 251
1938 Arlington High School Addition 517
1946 Arlington High School Addition 669
1949-50 Arlington High School Addition 904
1952-53 Arlington High School Addition 1,169
1956 Arlington High School Addition 2,235
1957 Prospect High School 2,773
1962 Forest View High School 6,323
1964 Wheeling High School 8,276
1966 Elk Grove High School 10,784
1968J ohn Hersey High School 13,520
1971 Rolling Meadows High School 17,419
1973 Buffalo Grove High School 19,000
1984 Arlington High School Closed 13,742
1986 Forest View High School Closed 12,447
1988 Edward Gilbert Administrative Complex Dedicated 10,848
1989 Maryville Education Center/Nipper School (MEC) 10,381
1992 STEP becomes Forest View Alternative School 10,597
1996 MEC / Nipper School becomes Nipper Career Education Center 11,243
1997 Vanguard School 11,443
2002 Newcomer Center 12,102
2004 Nipper Career Education Center Closed 12,500

[204parent]

My office is in Elk Grove. Many of my coworkers live in Arlington Heights, Elk Grove, Buffalo Grove, etc. When I relocated to this area several years ago, I asked my coworkers where I should look for a house. The first question they asked was whether I had kids. When I said yes, they all told me to look in Naperville. Nobody recommended the SD 214 area, and they all live there!

[204parent]

If you want to compare district 204 to another district, 203 is the best comparison. We're looking at a minimum of 20-25 years of overcrowding.

[cantretirehere]

Okay, if 203 is the best district with which to compare 204 - let’s do it, let’s compare:

230 contains a large portion of Naperville and so does 204. So one can look at that and say that, for those portions of the districts, the demographics “might” be about the same. (More about that later). Probably, many of Naperville’s residents are employed by the same employers. But 203 contains portions of Lisle, Woodridge and Bolingbrook. 204 contains portions of Aurora, Plainfield, and Bolingbrook. Leaving Bolingbrook out of the equation, does Lisle/Woodridge have the same demographics as Aurora/Plainfield?

District 203 is 32 sq miles in size, 204 is 46 sq miles in size, 33% difference– bigger difference than likness IMO.

District 203 is approx 113 years old (from the year they bought Naper School to be used as a public school – in actuality 203 is probably even older). District 204 is approx 34 years old. – bigger difference than likeness IMO.

Now for the comment I made above “more about that later”. District 203 has a “downtown” area that attracts a certain demographic. District 204 does not have a “downtown” area within its borders. This makes the Naperville portions of each district different! So the one commonality between the two districts is TAINTED by this FACT.

These are big differences that preclude the comparison of 204 to 203 to strengthen either the YES or the NO vote.

Oh, wait -
In District 203 less than 35% of households have school age children. Is this the statistic you were using to determine that “203 is the best comparison” to 204? Okay, I concede. You twisted my arm, I agree, 204 is headed really fast toward less than 35% of our households having school aged children (because 203 and 204 are so much alike)

[admin]

In District 203 less than 35% of households have school age children.

I would like to see where you got that from. It is very interesting.

[cantretirehere]

easy - from the district 203 seb site

[cantretirehere]

I apologize, I realize my response to the graph was a bit snotty. I didn't realize it til I posted it and re-read it.
Give me a minute and I'll rephrase it

[admin]

Give me a link at least. ;D

[cantretirehere]

How about an analogy:
Let's say I just got a cute littel Bichon puppy. I want to know what it's personality is going to be like 10 years from now. So I look "next door". Out on Springbrook prairie I spy a 10 year old coyote. My bichon is canine, so is the coyote. My bichon and the coyote live in the same vicinity. My bichon eats rabbit poop in my yard and so does the coyote. So I look at the coyote to determine what my bichon is going to be like.

Would't I be better off comparing my Bichon to a Poodle living in Fort Worth?

I think we need to find a Midwestern community with the same demographics as ours and see how they are fairing. My first impulse is to say Coon Rapids, Minn. Based on some articles I read about 10 years ago. I believed at that time it was being compared to Naperville. I have no idea what has been happening up there or if the districts are the same, but maybe we shouldn't be looking in our backyard or we may be making a wrong comparison i.e. Bichon vs coyote

[cantretirehere]

what you gonna make me do more work? ok give me a sec

[fence]

I think people are just tring to find a baseline for enrollment projections. I guess since I live in Naperville, using my same town as a benchmark is not out of the realm of reason.

For example, I'm not sure I quite understand the relevance of the town itself being within one SD or the other. I live closer to downtown Naperville than 1/2 of the Naperville residents feeding District 203. People move to my neighborhood because they can practically walk to town, attracting the same demographic as the 203 areas that surround us, even though we are in 204.

Also, predicting the future of a district would preclude that we compare to an older district, because how could we use a district of the same age to predict the future? There would be nothing to compare it to.

I'd also say that a Woodridge/Aurora comparison might actually be a decent one. At least the parts of each that feed into the 203/204 systems.

Maybe I'm not understanding exactly what you're trying to get at. What do you think would be a better comparison?

[cantretirehere]

www.naperville203.org/assets/profile%2D2005%2Epdf

gotta go for the rest of the week HSers just got home and the district has off for a few days. Won't have much time to be posting.

[admin]

Is this SD ever in session? ;D