JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – If you’ve driven near Wolfson High School in the San Jose area of Jacksonville lately you can’t miss the massive amount of home and apartment development going on.
Hundreds of new homes and massive apartment complexes are quickly being built.
News4JAX is looking into what that means for area schools like Wolfson and others that may have to absorb all the new students.
While the development is all surrounding Wolfson along Powers Avenue, that school will be affected the least but a lot of other schools in the area will see a flood of new students.
Locals are noticing and wondering whether the schools can absorb all the new children who are expected to move in.
“I think it’s too crowded,” said Eddie Mims who lives in the area. “There’s a lot of poor planning and development going on in this city.”
Duval County Public Schools said Wolfson mostly won’t be impacted because it’s a magnet school and not zoned for neighborhood students. Most children in the area will go to Atlantic Coast which is at nearly capacity but there’s $20 million in the budget for an expansion.
Some students will also go to Englewood.
Students who want to go to Wolfson in the area will be able to apply and they’ll be given preferential treatment to get into that program over children who don’t live in the area.
But that’s not the case for nearby Kings Trail Elementary and Dupont Middle which are schools zoned for the new residents.
DCPS said Kings Trail is currently at 55% utilization and has a lot of room. The same is true at Dupont Middle which is at 59% utilization and has a lot of room, too.
It’s unclear how long it will be before all these students will be showing up. The apartments appear to be almost done but across the street from Wolfson, the land has been cleared but most of the homes still need to be built.