With a goal of Better Serving all Students and Families, Winston-Salem/Forsyth County Schools (WS/FCS) has launched a two-year planning process to explore options for modernizing the district’s residential boundaries to increase socioeconomic diversity and enhance school transportation efficiency. A key aspect of the planning process is securing feedback from families, students, staff and the community. Below are answers to your most Frequently Asked Questions.

WS/FCS is the fourth largest school district in North Carolina, yet our residential boundaries have remained largely unchanged since we launched the School Choice Plan more than 30 years ago. Over time, our schools have become less socio-economically diverse with nearly 70% of our schools categorized as economically segregated with high concentrations of poverty.

Research shows that students do better academically when they go to school with children from a range of economic backgrounds and are 68% more likely to enroll in a four-year college than students in schools with a high concentration of poverty.

Transportation remains a district-wide challenge with opportunities for enhanced efficiency through this plan. For example, updating residential boundaries to better serve schools, roadways and neighborhoods that have been built or expanded in the past 30 years.

The work of assessing the current system of school choice and neighborhood schools has been underway for many years, including the formation of the district’s Office of Equity, Access, and Acceleration in 2019. To further these equity efforts, in 2023 WS/FCS applied for an inaugural Fostering Diverse Schools Demonstration Grant from the U.S. Department of Education. In October of 2023, WS/FCS learned that it was one of 12 school districts to receive a planning grant.

The nearly $1 million in funding from the federal Fostering Diverse Schools program enables WS/FCS to:

• conduct an in-depth assessment of the district’s current residential boundaries with input from families, students, staff and the community and

• develop a comprehensive plan designed to enhance socio-economic diversity in our schools and realize transportation efficiencies.

The first step of the planning process conducted in early 2024 was to analyze current and historical student enrollment and attendance based on residential boundaries and school choice plans. WS/FCS will not begin developing its comprehensive plan until it has completed the work of securing input from families, students, staff and the larger community.

WS/FCS is seeking significant input from families, students, staff and the larger community throughout the planning process with a goal of reaching 8,000 individuals by the end of 2024.

• Listening Sessions – WS/FCS is partnering with Urban Strategies to facilitate Listening Sessions with families, students, staff and the community. These in-person and virtual sessions are being recorded to produce a robust summary of feedback, hopes, concerns, and questions. New sessions  are being added as they are scheduled so please continue to check the Fostering Diverse Schools webpage to find a date and time that works best for you.

• Surveys – Online surveys are available in both English and Spanish.

• Feedback Hotline – Leave a message on the Fostering Diverse Schools feedback hotline at 336-727-8029.

• Plan Feedback - In early 2025, the Fostering Diverse Schools team will share proposals for residential boundary changes and transportation efficiencies. Families, students, staff and the community will then have the opportunity to provide additional feedback before a final plan is presented to the WS/FCS Board of Education by late Summer/early Fall 2025.

The most immediate way to view the feedback we’ve received to date is the Fostering Diverse Schools dashboard. This dashboard captures in real time the participation data for the Listening Sessions and Surveys as well as common feedback themes.

• Dashboard English

• Dashboard Spanish

The Fostering Diverse Schools team will then present a summary of this feedback to the WS/FCS Board of Education in early 2025.

The WS/FCS Board of Education will have the final say on the comprehensive plan in terms of what is included and when it will be implemented. We anticipate presenting the plan to the Board in the late Summer/early Fall of 2025. Any changes to residential boundaries would not be implemented prior to the 2026/2027 school year.

WS/FCS is committed to maintaining school options for all families, including the option to remain at your student’s current school. Our goal is to minimize disruption for our students and families so any changes to school assignments would be carefully phased in over time.

WS/FCS will continue to have Magnet schools and the program of choice will remain. Earlier this year, WS/FCS received a separate federal magnet grant to expand and enhance our magnet school program.

Like many other school districts, WS/FCS is experiencing a driver shortage leading to transportation challenges for some families. Those challenges are made more difficult by our current residential boundaries which have not kept pace with new school construction, new roadways and general growth patterns in our county. This has resulted in transportation inefficiencies, for example,  transporting students farther away than necessary because their residential school isn’t the closest school to their home.

All information about the Fostering Diverse Schools planning process will be shared via the web page and dashboard, as well as through WS/FCS communications directly to families, students, staff and the community.

Once the comprehensive plan is implemented, we will measure its success by looking at 3 key metrics; 1) socioeconomic diversity of our schools 2) academic performance and 3) satisfaction of our students, staff and families. Your feedback will continue to be important as we assess and improve.

In addition to socioeconomic diversity, the comprehensive plan will take into account factors such as classroom size, transportation and proximity.

The goal of this comprehensive plan is to create greater socioeconomic diversity in our schools. We use Socioeconomic Status (SES) to assess diversity in our community. SES is a composite measure of factors such a median family income, adult educational attainment, home ownership rates, and the percentage of single-parent households.