ST. LANDRY PARISH — Parents of students at Opelousas Junior High School are speaking out after the St. Landry Parish School Board revealed the state has given the district two options following the school's seventh consecutive F rating.
The St. Landry Parish School Board held a Committee of the Whole meeting Tuesday night, where officials informed the community that the state is requiring the district to either turn Opelousas Junior High over to state control or merge the junior high school with the senior high school. You can read about that meeting here.
Parents who spoke with us said neither option is acceptable.
Patricia Keys, a parent of an Opelousas Junior High student, said she believes the school should remain as it is.
"I can't really say much, but I think they should just leave it the way it is because they already done changed the school system already," she said.
Keys also expressed concern about the possibility of her child attending senior high school.
"Oh Lord, I'm kind of scared. It's too fast."
Felece King, also a guardian of an Opelousas Junior High student, said she worries a merger would expose younger students to an environment they are not ready for.
"I don't think it would be a good idea mixing, putting the schools together," she said.
King said the age and maturity gap between junior high and high school students is at the heart of her concern.
"Because some of the kids, the kids like in the seventh and eighth grade, I think they're a little bit too small and not mature enough to handle the high school students as of right now. So, I don't think it would be a good idea. I think it would be a lot of, maybe fighting, and it just wouldn't be a good idea," she said.
The concerns are not limited to parents. King said her granddaughter, a student at the school, is also frightened by the prospect of merging with the high school.
"She's afraid that, I mean, she's very quiet, first of all. She's a very quiet child, and she's afraid that, you know, she's going to get picked on or maybe fought," King said.
