Wayzata school board votes to redistrict, impacting about 500 students

WAYZATA, Minn. (KMSP) - The school board in Wayzata, Minnesota, voted Monday to move forward with a controversial plan that impacts hundreds of students.

Many parents were outraged with the redistricting proposal, which will send about 500 students to a different school in the fall of 2019.

There has been a series of meetings on this issue where fired up parents have gathered with signs, protesting and speaking out. Monday, they were on the losing end of the boundary battle.

"It doesn’t make sense; you’re moving kids who don’t need to be moved," one parent said.

Wayzata parents tried to persuade school board members at the last minute to allow the children in the Heather’s Pond neighborhood to remain in their current elementary schools.

Many families will soon have to re-arrange their lives to accommodate a fast-growing district.

“It changes our start times in the morning from 7:45 a.m. to 8:30 a.m., which is a big impact for families like mine; both my husband and I work outside of the home,” parent Andrea Dobrin said. 

Wayzata voters approved a $70 million referendum last fall that funded construction for a new elementary school. The district is predicting close to 1,000 homes will be built by 2020.

Now, they're trying to be proactive in accommodating all the new students moving in.

But families living in a handful of neighborhoods across the street from Greenwood Elementary feel like they're being targeted. Parents say instead of walking or biking to school, they'll have to drive their kids several miles down the road.

“There’s only, like, four other third graders, and we’re just being singled out with this proposal,” parent Elizabeth Aseltine said.