Tonight (Thursday, May 22) at 7:00 the Castro Valley Unified School District (CVUSD) Board of Education will discuss the school district’s plan to relocate the Alma Pre-School from its current location on Seven Hills Road to a new location on the Marshall Elementary campus, next to the baseball fields on Omega Avenue. Marshall already hosts the Marshall School State Preschool and a YMCA after school program on its campus.

At its April 10, 2014 meeting, the Castro Valley Unified School District (CVUSD) Board of Education authorized the District “to solicit bids for the installation of five portables classrooms at Marshall Elementary School for the Alma Pre-School Program.” Previous CVUSD Board of Education meetings going back to February 2014 discussed the need for additional space for Alma and other CVUSD school sites, but many parents in the Marshall and Alma communities were not aware that CVUSD planned to relocate Alma, which provides services to special needs students, “including children with multiple disabilities, visual impairment, speech and language impairment, autism, intellectual disability, physical impairment, and other health impairments,” between the ages of three and five. Citing Gov. Code 53094, subd. (b), CVUSD will vote to legally exempt itself from local zoning laws in order to install the portables at Marshall.

After evaluating locations throughout the district, CVUSD determined that blacktop surface next to the lower Marshall baseball fields was the most cost-effective location for the five new portables, as they could be connected to preexisting electrical and sewage services. Many Marshall parents claim that they and the surrounding community were not sufficiently consulted about the relocation of Alma, and only first heard about it in a Wednesday, May 7 note to parents announcing a meeting about the topic scheduled for Friday, May 9 at 6:00 PM.

CVUSD referred CVM to this document, outlining the history of the decision to obtain the portables and relocate Alma.

Michael Baldwin, a concerned Marshall Elementary parent, provided CVM with this perspective on the situation.

An update on the relocation of Alma is scheduled for tonight’s Board of Education meeting at 7:00 at the District Offices at 4400 Alma Avenue.  Here is a link to tonight’s Board Packet. Also of note is