Eden Prairie School District Trying To Desegregate

EDEN PRAIRIE (AP) -- The Eden Prairie School Board has come up with a plan to try to desegregate the increasingly diverse district.

It endorsed a plan Tuesday to move as many as 1,100 students in grades five and six from an intermediate school into K-4 elementary schools next fall.

District boundary lines would be redrawn to balance concentrations of poverty, which aligns with race.

The decision has been widely anticipated by metro-area districts facing similar changes in student demographics, as they address the segregation of poverty and race in schools.

The plan was opposed by many parents who feared the loss of neighborhood K-4 schools.

Officials with the school district, which has 9,700 students,expects to release a new boundary map by Jan. 15.

(Copyright 2010 by The Associated Press.  All Rights Reserved.)