Rezoning and new campus to ease overcrowding for middle schools

MADISON – Months of work have resulted in rezoning plans for Madison City Schools that will affect students at Discovery and Liberty middle schools.

The current rezone’s design will eliminate overcrowding at the two middle schools with a significant reduction in enrollment, MCS Superintendent Dr. Ed Nichols said.

“Madison continues to grow by leaps and bounds. Even during COVID-19, we continue to grow. When building a new school, rezoning is always necessary,” Nichols said.

“Since we’re going to allow the current sixth- and seventh-grade students the option to remain at Liberty or Discovery, those schools may not decline as much as they will going forward,” Nichols said. “Journey Middle School (on Celtic Drive) will have more students after the rezoning since they currently house zero students.”

This rezoning will place middle school students at Journey. “No Discovery students are being rezoned to Liberty. No Liberty students are being rezoned to Discovery,” Nichols said.

One exception: One small rezone is occurring at the high-school level to unite a neighborhood built in stages; students currently attend both James Clemens and Bob Jones. The rezoning will place all these students at Bob Jones. This neighborhood includes homes on Shiloh Creek and Old Willow (and connects with Coach Lamp Drive), Nichols said.

“Currently, Madison and Triana have approved around 4,000 new homes that will be developed over the next five to eight years. This growth will add around 2,000 new students,” Nichols said. “In the future, we will need to add an eighth elementary and expand both of our high schools. This rezoning and the addition of the new middle school will certainly give us the space needed for this growth at the middle-school level.”

MCS leaders have a goal always to balance school populations as representative of the community and “allow all students to have an equal opportunity to thrive academically, athletically and socially,” Nichols said. “Since we’re blessed with diversity in all our neighborhoods, our schools are always rich with racial diversity, as well as cultural diversity.”

“Our mission is to prepare our students for global success. Our schools are truly a microcosm of society and will help prepare them,” Nichols said. “By balancing our schools since the school district’s inception, we have been able to provide our parents an outstanding school . . . regardless of where they live in our community.”

Students affected by the rezoning will attend their ‘new’ schools on Aug. 3, 2022, which is the first day of the 2022-2023 school year.

The MCS website has the current proposal for rezoning, which was updated for enrollment captured in September 2021. To access rezoning details and a map, visit madisoncity.k12.al.us, click the “Our district” dropdown menu, and click “Rezoning info.”