West Bend Schools Losing Kids to Virtual Schools

This is an interesting story.  A while ago the news came out that for the first time, more kids were leaving the West Bend School District under open enrollment than were coming in.  This is significant because it indicates that something must be wrong with the district for people to be choosing to leave it.  As it turns out, a significant number of the kids who are leaving are going to virtual schools.

Of 60 people surveyed who applied to leave the district, 19, or 32 percent, are headed to a virtual school, such as Northern Ozaukee, to which eight applied. The Slinger School District drew 12 students, the second-most-popular destination.

This is significant when put in context.  The West Bend School District is gearing up for a massive school referendum that is based on the need to build new schools and update old schools.  Some of the thinking going into deciding how much the referendum should be is how nice the new facilities should be.  The design and materials used in construction has a huge impact on the cost of the project.  Some people have been saying that the new facilities need to be really nice.  Why?  Because of the perception that some kids were leaving the West Bend schools for the Slinger schools, which just built some really nice facilities. 

This information that far more kids are going to virtual schools than Slinger schools kind of puts a dagger in that rationalization for more lavish schools. 

The truth is that the West Bend schools provide a good education.  Good education can be delivered in the Taj Mahal or a warehouse.  The building matters much less than the people in it and work being done there.  I hope that the school board members will keep this in mind when they are calculating how many millions of dollars they plan to ask for.