County changes Spring Break, OKs McFadden admissions on The Murfreesboro Post

Sidebar Ads

County changes Spring Break, OKs McFadden admissions

Related Articles

Weekend Planner: McFadden students featured in MTSU production

Anything could happen as MS tourney opens

Central Magnet to host Super Trivia Bowl

Local test scores improve

Rutherford County Schools director resigns

JORDAN: Central Magnet on its way

Six RuCo teams make postseason

Eagleville School expansion moves closer to final approval

Junior Achievement honors RuCo teacher

Mary Frances Hooper Brandon

View All

By: MICHELLE WILLARD, Post Staff Writer

Posted: Friday, August 14, 2009 1:52 pm

Rutherford County students will go on Spring Break a little earlier than thought this year. The county school board approved Thursday night a measure that moves Spring Break from mid-April to March 22-26.

The change is warranted by a state move, which changed the dates allowed for TCAP testing. City schools have not yet announced any plans to change its Spring Break dates. ••• Current sixth, seventh and eighth grade students at McFadden School of Excellence will be given automatic admission to the new Central Magnet Academy when it opens next fall.

The school board approved the proposed admissions standards for the new school at its meeting Thursday night. “I couldn’t believe it when they gave blanket approval with no academic requirements for all McFadden students now in the fifth, sixth and seventh grade to transfer to Central,” one angry parent told WGNS Radio.

All McFadden students, enrolled as of April 24, 2008, will be given preferential admittance, if they meet the minimum academic standards. Discovery School at Reeves-Rodgers parents voiced concern last week that their gifted students may not make the cut into Central’s new magnet classes when it opens next year because of a provision that grandfathers in McFadden School of Excellence students and their siblings. McFadden students and siblings would not be admitted automatically under the proposal, Evans said.

They still need to meet the same criteria as other students to qualify for admission and get first shot at open seats for the next five years. Director of Schools Harry Gill Jr. removed the “sibling rule” from the proposed admission standards before the meeting.

According to the proposed admissions policy, all applicants, including McFadden students, must have a minimum of 3.0 GPA and score at least in the 80th percentile in all areas of the TCAP. Evans explained at the time the clause was put in because McFadden students were promised a kindergarten through eighth-grade education and the school will no longer offer the middle school grades after Central opens as a sixth-grade through12th-grade magnet school next fall.

Michelle Willard can be contacted at 615-869-0816 or mwillard@murfreesboropost.com.

Tagged under Central Magnet, McFadden, RCS, Spring Break

Member Opinions:

By: confused on 8/14/09
So where are the children going that currently go to Central...?Have we built a new middle school and if so, where is it cause i haven't heard a word about it!

By: enoughisenough on 8/15/09
This article brings up even more questions. If McFadden students were promised K-8, why are their 8th graders being given automatic admission. Since there was not a High School magnet, at least until now, why should they not have to re-test and be on the same playing field as the rest of the County.

And confused, where have you been? This has been a topic in Rutherford County for the past YEAR!