Today the Bend-La Pine Schools'
Attendance Area Review Committee revealed its recommendations for where kids in different areas of Bend will attend middle and high school, once Bend's new high school is operational. The committee was tasked with taking input from the community, who had three boundary options to choose from, and then make a final recommendation.
Bend-La Pine Schools
Bend-La Pine Schools High School proposed attendance areas for the 2021 school year.
The committee presented the results to Superintendent Shay Mikalson today, who will make the final decision by March 10.
The most obvious change is that the boundary area for students attending Bend High has shrunk and moved north and west, because the majority of the students who will attend the new high school will come from Bend High's current attendance area. Students who live south of SE Reed Market Road will attend the new high school under the recommended boundary changes. Bend High's new boundary will also include some of the Orchard District to the north, and neighborhoods along Brookswood Boulevard to the west.
This changes the boundaries for Summit High School as well. When the new attendance areas take effect, only students who live along Century Drive and in the Tetherow and Broken Top neighborhoods, and northwest of the Deschutes River will remain at Summit High.
The new attendance areas will go into effect in the fall of 2021. Bend-La Pine Schools was tasked with changing the boundaries because the district is building a new high school in southeast Bend on the corner of Knott Road and SE 15th Street which will open in the fall of 2021.
Beginning in December Bend-La Pine Schools invited the community to offer input on three separate middle and high school attendance area proposals. Read the full process of deciding on these final recommendations
here.
Bend-La Pine Schools
Bend-La Pine Schools Middle School proposed attendance areas for the 2021 school year.
While the school district is not building another middle school, Assistant Superintendent of Bend-La Pine Schools Lora Nordquist told the
Source in an email that the district is changing middle school boundaries because some schools are at capacity. High Desert Middle School is about 60 students over capacity and Cascade Middle School is at capacity, while Pilot Butte Middle School has room for 200 students. A second reason for changing the middle school attendance areas is so that students can stay in the same general area for middle and high school and stay with the same group of students, Nordquist said.
Students and parents can submit their comments on the proposal by filling out the
Attendance Area Review Survey.
Parents can file a
request to attend a school outside of their new attendance zone next winter.
Students and parents can view maps and read how the committee decided on the boundaries
here.