SPANISH FORT, Ala.—The Baldwin County Board of Education has released the map for the proposed rezoning of areas in Spanish Fort, which will shuffle 190 students from Rockwell Elementary to Spanish Fort Elementary.

A second community meeting is set for 6 p.m. Jan. 20 at Spanish Fort High School for administrators to gather community input.

The reason for the rezoning  is due to overcrowding at Rockwell, and vacancy at Spanish Fort Elementary.

The change, however, won’t go into effect until the 2009-10 school year.

Vacant classrooms at Spanish Fort Elementary stem from  the previous sixth-graders the school held before the new Spanish Fort Middle School opened in August.

Spanish Fort Elementary now serves just kindergarten through fifth grade, as does Rockwell, which always served kindergarten through fifth grade.

The Baldwin County Board of Education is expected to vote on the rezoning at its Jan. 29 meeting, according to Terry Wilhite, school board spokesman. Areas affected, if rezoned, include all roads that connect to Stagecoach Road, including Buzbee Road and Sibley Creek Road. Also, U.S. Highway 31 west toward the Spanish Fort school zone, which includes the Wakefield and Wilson Heights neighborhoods, will be affected.

Parents will be updated on rezoning by a news release from the Baldwin County Board of Education’s Communications Department, letters sent home from Rockwell and Spanish Fort Elementary schools, notices will be posted on Rockwell’s Web site at www.rockwellelem.org and online at the board’s official Web site at www.bcbe.org, Wilhite said.

Rockwell’s current enrollment is set at 809 students; Spanish Fort Elementary currently has 559 students, Wilhite said.

“Capacity is driven by programming and scheduling,” Wilhite said in an e-mail.  “Despite, creativity with programming and scheduling, it has reached the point where there is no more flexibility.

“They’re using every nook and cranny, including closets for office space.”

 The board has monitored growth patterns for Spanish Fort using its geographic information systems technology, which monitors and analyzes growth patterns and helps predict what residential housing will be like in Spanish Fort for the coming years, a news release said.

The data estimates that over the next five to 10 years more than 2,000 new residential housing units will be sold in Rockwell’s school zone, based on the current real estate market, the release said.

About 300 new apartments have been constructed on U.S. Highway 31 behind the Eastern Shore Centre next to Rockwell Elementary, the release said.

A community meeting was held in August to get feedback from residents about the proposed rezoning.

Parents at the meeting said they were concerned about the mental strain the change would inflict on their children, while some expressed concerns over the change in curriculum, the location of the school, leaving friends behind and the fact that many purchased homes to be close to their child’s school.

Some parents said they were upset because they’ve invested money into their child’s school with T-shirts and supplies and said they didn’t want to start over.

Also at the first community meeting, parents of Rockwell students were concerned their child may be forced to attend three different schools in a three-year period. The student will attend Rockwell for fourth grade, Spanish Fort Elementary for firth grade and Spanish Fort Middle for sixth grade.

Many parents of Rockwell students said there are many students who attend Rockwell, however, they live in TimberCreek, a neighborhood in Daphne. With this, parents said Spanish Fort students should attend Spanish Fort schools, and Daphne students should attend Daphne schools.

This meeting allowed the board to see how parents felt about the proposed rezoning, and also to clarify any rumors.