From left, Cherry Hill school board President Gina Winters, board member Joel Mayer, Superintendent Kwame R. Morton and board member Renee Cherfane, who chairs the board's Elementary Balancing Committee.
Facing projected sharp growth in elementary student enrollment, the Cherry Hill school board is working on an "Elementary Enrollment Balancing" plan that could include moving students among schools to prevent anticipated overcrowding.
The district, using a 2024 demographic forecast by Statistical Forecasting LLC of East Dorset, Vermont, expects additional seats will be needed at several schools in the 2028-29 school year:
- Barton, 126 additional seats
- Kilmer, 81
- Stockton, 56
- Mann, 50
- Woodcrest, 24
"That's almost half of some of our schools," board member Renee Cherfane said of the projected need at Barton.
Cherfane, who chairs the board committee on balancing, this week appeared on a district YouTube video with Superintendent Kwame R. Morton, board President Gina Winters and board member Joel Mayer.Â
"Lots of additional seats that we'll need throughout the district in those schools specifically, and this effort is to ensure that we're ready for the future while also maintaining a high-quality education," Cherfane said.
While no balancing decisions have been made, Morton said he "anticipates challenges and concerns from community members."
Three meetings — one of them virtual — for parents and others are planned in November.
"Our goal is to minimize disruptions while addressing the future needs of the district," board President Winters said of the board's mission in balancing enrollment among the elementary schools.
The board committee has "guardrails" that set the boundaries in the board planning.
"The guardrails that we've established thus far are, first of all, to maximize transportation and efficiencies in transportation so that costs and bus route times can be factored in appropriately; also aligning special education programs, again, to minimize costs and to reduce student time on buses, which we know has become an issue from time to time," Mayer said in the video.
The board members emphasized a fundamental goal is a long-term solution to overcrowding.Â
Cherfane acknowledged that Cherry Hill is a hot housing market where houses go up for sale and are "snatched up immediately, many of which are families with existing school-age children or soon-to-be school-age. Lots of preschool families coming into the district, lots of soon-to-be families."
Statistical Forecasting's demographic study also noted the impact of new homes and apartments on the schools. The report cited a total of 1,227 new apartments, condos and townhomes expected in Barton elementary school's coverage area alone.
Winters said the committee met with a group of district stakeholders and ideas for solutions that emerged included using the Lewis Administration Building at 45 Ranoldo Terrace as a school once again.
Other potential solutions, she said, were grouping the schools by proximity to optimize resources and a "comprehensive revision of the elementary school boundaries themselves."
