Slots remain open in city's magnet schools

Carver Magnet School teacher Sherrie Salem gives a lesson on sentence structure in her English class Friday afternoon.

By: Jim Cook | Dothan Eagle
Published: March 20, 2009

The initial application period to get into Dothan’s magnet schools is over, but many slots remain open in certain grade levels as the process goes into its second round.

The initial application period ended on Feb. 27 and parents of students who got in were recently notified by letter of their acceptance. The schools received about 1,200 applications for 1,141 spots. While the total number of applications exceeded the number of spots available, there are still slots open because some grade levels got more applications than spots were available for, while other grade levels had more spots than applications. For example, at Montana Magnet School, 37 slots were available in the fourth grade and 47 applications were received while at the fifth grade level 42 spots were available and 31 applications were received.

While only a handful of seats now remain open at the elementary schools, about 100 seats each remain open at Beverlye Magnet School and Carver Magnet School. Unlike the elementary schools, Beverlye and Carver each require students to take and pass an entrance exam to be admitted. Both schools received fewer applications than there were slots available, however. Carver had 223 slots open and got 145 applications. Beverlye had 361 open slots and received 325 applications.

The second round of the application period will last until Oct. 1. Parents who wish to enroll their children in the program may do so by picking up an application at any of the schools and turning it in to the central office on Dusy Street. Dothan City School Superintendent Sam Nichols said the system will also allow students to take the middle school magnet program’s entrance exam during this period.

In June 2008, the Dothan City School Board established Heard Elementary School and Beverlye Middle School as magnet schools. The addition of these two schools was part of a rezoning program that split the city schools into a Dothan High School and Northview High School cluster/feeding system.

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Carver Middle School
Sixth Grade 24
Seventh Grade 31
Eighth Grade 41

Beverlye Middle School
Sixth Grade 60
Seventh Grade 0
Eighth Grade 42

Montana Magnet School
Kindergarten 0
First Grade 0
Second Grade 0
Third Grade 0
Fourth Grade 0
Fifth Grade 13

Heard Magnet School
Kindergarten 0
First Grade 0
Second Grade 0
Third Grade 18
Fourth Grade 1
Fifth Grade 0