District schools voted to become K-6 by 2009-2010

All Newport-Mesa elementary schools will be kindergarten through sixth grade schools in the coming years after a reconfiguration proposal was unanimously approved at the district’s school board meeting Tuesday night.

The reconfiguration aims to make the district more uniform and lessen the amount of transitions young students are forced to make between schools.

“Studies show that students who move fewer times tend to do better academically and socially,” said school board member Judy Franco.

The proposal would initiate a two-year plan to change the schools, reshape some boundaries and transition teachers, Franco said. All schools would become K-6 by the 2009-10 school year, except Davis Elementary, which would become a magnet school — a school that specializes in specific areas of study — and Kaiser/Woodland, which would be untouched, according to the reconfiguration study produced in December 2007. The cost of the reconfiguration is estimated at $2.3 million, according to the proposal.

The district is asking for feedback on the reconfiguration and the specialized focus. E-mail district spokeswoman Laura Boss at lboss@nmusd.us.

— Daniel Tedford