Just one year after school districts were told they would receive “historic” levels of state funding, it was maddening to learn that some local families are going to lose the opportunity to have a bus take their kids to and from school each day.
Pine Harbor Christian Academy (PCHA), which resides along Highway 61 between Cottage Grove and Hastings, has received busing services from ISD 833 (South Washington County Schools) for decades. Though it is physically closer to the City of Cottage Grove, Pine Harbor has a Hastings address. The River Oaks Golf Course, which, if you know the area, literally abuts Pine Harbor’s property to the north and west, has a Cottage Grove address.
Recently ISD 833 notified Pine Harbor that it was canceling busing to the school.
Cottage Grove parents are understandably upset and are wondering why, after more than 40 years, the district is refusing to bring roughly 80 kids to Pine Harbor each day.
Pine Harbor officials and impacted parents have said the school district is statutorily obligated to provide this service, referencing a state law that requires public school districts to provide transportation within the district for resident students attending nonpublic schools.
They specifically note language stating, “it is in the public interest to provide equality of treatment in transporting school children of the state who are required to attend elementary and secondary schools pursuant to chapter 120A, so that the health, welfare and safety of such children, while using the public highways of the state, shall be protected.”
ISD 833 told the parents that “Pine Harbor Christian Academy is located in the Hastings Public School District. Because we have a comparable, appropriate nonpublic school located within our school district’s boundary” – in this case, New Life Academy in Woodbury – “we are not required to transport students to PHCA.”
In other words, the gist of ISD 833’s reasoning is this: it’s a private, Christian school with a Hastings address, so we’re done.
Following the legislature’s “historic” funding increase, the South Washington County School District receives more than $219 million in general education revenue. And yet, it wants to end a 40+ year run of busing a small number of kids to a private school because it apparently just realized the Pine Harbor facility sits outside the City of Cottage Grove’s boundaries, and because it believes it’s meeting the letter of the law by offering transportation to a different private school within the district (Woodbury) – a facility that is, I’m told, at full capacity and is not accepting new students.
In my opinion, this is an awful look for the South Washington County School District. When you are an organization that, at its core, is about helping kids, and your bean counters have convinced you to potentially make a decision that hurts kids, you have failed.
The school district’s motto is be seen, be heard, be bold. Well, any decision made by a school district that forces kids to lose is far from bold. In fact, bold would be admitting this poor decision is a mistake and reversing course.
Make the bold move, South Washington County Schools. Do the right thing. Continue busing the 80 kids to Pine Harbor.