DANVILLE -- A proposed grade realignment of Danville Area School District elementary students would result in two new bus routes and mini routes and $152,000 in additional transportation costs.

"This is the gross cost before any increase in state reimbursement," Superintendent Dr. Susan Bickford said Thursday.

Adding two new bus routes would reduce riding times for children. The additional routes are proposed for the Riverside/Rush Township area and in the Liberty Valley area. Adding a number of mini routes will use secondary buses that will be available after they complete their runs, she said.

The bus route changes and realigning are proposed to meet a growing elementary enrollment. The realignment would mean third- through fifth-grade students will attend Liberty-Valley Elementary School, and kindergarteners through second-graders will go to Danville, Riverside or Mahoning-Cooper.

The Danville School Board may vote on the plan at its meeting at 7 p.m. Tuesday in the high school cafeteria.

The plan, maps of school coverage areas schools and other information can be found on the district's Web site at www.danvillek12.pa.us.

With the realignment, the district aims to keep classroom numbers at an average of 17 in kindergarten and first grades, an average of 19 in second grade and an average of 21 to 22 in third through fifth grades.

The district will be reimbursed additional transportation costs, Bickford said. The district is reimbursed for about 50 percent of its transportation costs from the state.

Bickford said the goals of the transportation plan were to create bus routes with less than an hour's ride per student.

"An attempt was also made to reduce bus transit times from what is currently being experienced," she said.

With routes based on current routes for students in kindergarten through fifth grades, the appropriate students would be discharged at the nearest elementary building or at Liberty Valley Intermediate Center and the bus would proceed directly to the building for the other age group to discharge those students.

An example is a bus picking up Mahoning-Cooper kindergarten through fifth graders, going to Mahoning-Cooper to discharge kindergarten through second graders and going directly to Liberty-Valley with third through fifth graders.

The routes are efficient and also take into account ages of students to keep them as simple as possible, she said.

While staggering start times between elementary levels and between elementary and second levels was discussed, the district isn't proposing this because of disruption to people's schedules, she said.

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