A projected 28 kindergartners may not be able to attend their neighborhood schools this fall due to space issues in Evanston/Skokie School District 65. The district is looking into a controversial proposal to “re-magnetize” their two magnet schools to help manage enrollment in the future.

Students who apply to the magnet schools-selective, specialized schools that attempt to draw students from all over the district-get preference if they live in a school zone with overcrowding concerns, said Pat Markham, the district’s communications director. Last year there were about 400 applications for more than 100 spots, said Markham. More applications allow D65 to be pickier in placement and even ensure gender and racial balances within each classroom, she said.

At the Feb. 16 Board of Education meeting, the Magnet School Study Committee presented a report outlining proposed theme changes to Dr. Bessie Rhodes Magnet School and King Lab Magnet School in order to make them more attractive. The committee was formed as part of the district’s five-year Strategic Plan.

Cathy Berlinger-Gustafson, the facilitator of the committee, said according to a U.S. Department of Education study, having magnet schools in a district improves the quality of every school in the same district.

“Magnet schools are helpful for the whole district,” she said. “It becomes a positive impetus to re-look at curriculum and instruction and how you do business.”

School board members, however, are worried about the financial demands the proposed developments could put on the already strained budget, especially when magnet school students make up only a small percentage of the district’s population.

“General education is our bread and butter; that’s who we are,” school board member Katie Bailey said at Tuesday’s meeting. “My big concern from before is the resources: what the magnet schools are going to give up to get this because we don’t have the budget.”

Debbie Price, parent of a Walker Elementary School student, asked the board to evaluate the benefits of the magnet schools, especially with so many cuts to general education classes. She said it is difficult to justify starting a new fine arts academy when, for example, kindergarten to second grade drama at Walker was recently cut.

“It’s a pie in the sky dream,” she said, referring to the magnet school revisions.

Berlinger-Gustafson said she thinks it is possible for the schools to be re-envisioned without financial changes.

“We really wanted to be able to do it within the budget limitations, within the financial constraints that the district has,” she said.

Committee member Suzanne Farrand, the D65 math and gifted coordinator, added that other school districts have solved the same problems.

“Schools like the ones we’re recommending to you exist; they exist all over the country,”

Farrand said at the meeting. “Which is why we’re optimistic that it is possible, and we are capable of developing these schools within the financial constraints.”

According to the proposal by the committee, Dr. Bessie Rhodes Magnet School would be converted to Dr. Bessie Rhodes School of Global Studies where students would receive daily Spanish lessons and, for sixth to eighth graders, daily Mandarin instruction. Travel abroad would be encouraged and international teacher exchanges would also foster a global outlook for students.

King Lab Magnet School would become Martin Luther King Jr. Literary and Fine Arts School, with a heavy focus on reading, writing and exposure to forms of art.

The board asked the administration to flesh out the research the Magnet School Study Committee already conducted and re-present it to the board in December 2010, with implementation beginning in the 2011-12 school year.

Keith Terry, school board president, emphasized the need for more investigation.

“It’s not like this is snapped shut, closed up and in the vault,” Terry said. “It’s a living, breathing thing.”[email protected]