Cedar Rapids school board OK’s deal to locate City View High at Metro Economic Alliance

CEDAR RAPIDS — The Cedar Rapids school board has approved a lease agreement with the Cedar Rapids Metro Economic Alliance for City View Community High School — the first magnet high school in the Iowa, opening this fall — to be located at the Alliance.

The school board approved the lease agreement Monday in a 5-1 vote, with member Dexter Merschbrock opposing the decision. Member Jennifer Neumann abstained from voting. Her husband, Doug Neumann, is the executive director of the Alliance.

Under the agreement, the school district will put $600,000 in to the Alliance building to remodel a portion of the space to be used as a high school. The cost of the project will come from the Physical Plant and Equipment Levy, one of the primary revenue sources for funding school infrastructure and equipment repairs, purchases and improvements.

Merschbrock, in explaining his opposition, said it was “very easy” to find money for the City View project while other projects — especially at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic — went unfunded. He suggested the board instead explore investing in renewable energy. Another option would have been, early in the pandemic, to establish temporary neighborhood learning centers to help students academically after school was forced to go online at the time, Merschbrock said.

“I think this is an opportunity to be conscientious when it comes to the decision making process and who has access to the decision makers,” Merschbrock said.

More than 105 incoming ninth and 10th-graders already are enrolled in City View Community High School, which officials say will provide students with more hands-on experiences than the traditional school model, according to comments at an April 10 school board meeting.

“People are finding this compelling,” Adam Zimmermann, executive director of middle schools for the district, said at the meeting earlier this month. By the 2025-26 school year, the district hopes to have 400 ninth-through — 12th-graders enrolled in City View.

Zimmermann said the school could be a “strategy for hope” as the district continues to see declining enrollment and could bring students back to the district. K-12 student enrollment in Cedar Rapids schools dropped 1,170 students — almost 10 percent — from 17,129 during the 2018-19 school year to 15,959 during the 2022-23 school year.

So far, a magnet coordinator, school counselor, language arts teacher, math teacher, science teacher and social studies teacher have been hired to work at City View. The district is also looking for a special-education teacher, secretary and part-time nurse for the program, according to board documents.

The Iowa BIG program also will be moved to the Cedar Rapids Metro Economic Alliance, 501 First St. SE, from its location at the Geonetric Building, 415 12th Ave. SE.

Iowa BIG — a concept championed by The Gazette’s parent company as the community rebuilt after the historic 2008 flood — is a part-time program where high school students team up with businesses to work on projects.

The City View lease agreement will automatically renew for successive one-year terms until June 30, 2028. The district can provide the Alliance with written notice of intent not to renew the agreement 60 days before the renewal.

The cost of the facility will be $8,333.33 a month, plus half of the utility fees split with the Alliance each month. The district will have exclusive use of portions of the facility designated “district space.” The Alliance will be required to perform background checks to ensure none of its employees are registered sex offenders or have been convicted of a sex offense against a minor.

The district will provide an employee to staff the front desk from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday and will pay to add security cameras, front door security locks and other upgraded improvements to the building. The Alliance will not have access to video from the cameras except through the district’s regular process for sharing security camera images with members of the public.

The district has put aside $1 million per year over three years of Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief funds to go toward the high school magnet program. It also has received several grants to launch City View, including part of a $14.8 million federal magnet schools grant to be distributed over the next five years.

The grant also will support the enhancement of four existing magnet schools — Johnson STEAM Academy, Cedar River Academy, Roosevelt Creative Corridor Business Academy and McKinley STEAM Academy. The district also operates the Kenwood Leadership Academy elementary magnet school.

Once the program is off the ground, it will be funded by state supplemental aid, which provides per-pupil funding for K-12 public schools.

Comments: (319) 398-8411; grace.king@thegazette.com