Parent fights for child to go to neighborhood school

NEW HANOVER COUNTY, NC (WWAY) — A New Hanover County family can see a new school from their front yard, but their child can’t go to it.

Instead, their five-year-old will need to ride a school bus for more than an hour.

“There’s only one child that this is affecting. That’s what is killing me as well, it’s one child, one child,” concerned parent, Drea Petty said.

Petty’s daughter starts kindergarten in a little more than three weeks.

“We were very excited watching all this construction going on knowing that our daughter would be starting there the first year it would open just to find out when it was time to enroll for kindergarten that she would be going to Castle Hayne,” Petty said.

A school, miles from home.

Not Blair Elementary, which is just a few hundred feet away. Making the start of school bittersweet.

“I want to go to the new Porters Neck school,” Petty’s daughter said.

Petty doesn’t understand why her daughter can’t go to the neighborhood school.

500 steps, it’s like maybe a tenth of a mile. It would take longer to even drive there,” Petty said.

She’s fought the school board and they’ve denied her request twice.

Deputy Superintendent Dr. Rick Holliday said it is out of his control.

“We’re doing the best we can to make sure that all of our students are served in the way that gives everybody a good school to go to,” Holliday said.

Dr. Holliday said Blair Elementary students will only use the building temporarily, while their school off market street is being demolished and rebuilt.

Once that is finished the building will become the new Porters Neck Elementary School, which is when district lines will be redrawn.

Until that happens, the Petty family is stuck.

“It does not seem to me that they care about the wellness or the health of my child whatsoever,” Petty said.

It could be three years before lines are redrawn, which is when Petty’s daughter might be able to attend her neighborhood school.

They can take this matter to court, something Drea Petty hopes she doesn’t have to do.