Many Lincoln parents are angry over the latest boundary proposals for Sunrise Elementary School.

"It's kind of like they said we're throw-aways," said Tonya Gieser of Lincoln, referring to other comments Lincoln residents made during an information meeting Monday at Will-Moore Elementary School.

Many people from Lincoln spoke out against moving their students to accommodate overcrowding in north Bismarck schools. The most recent Sunrise boundary proposals move Lincoln students to Murphy Elementary School from Will-Moore Elementary School.

Lincoln parents said they are fed-up with being moved whenever the district wants to rebalance enrollment at other schools. It makes it more frustrating when the district has land in Lincoln for an elementary school, but keeps putting off a decision on building there in favor of other schools.

Gieser moved to Lincoln 13 years ago, when her oldest son was three years old. Even then, she had heard the district planned to build a school there. She's no longer interested in that carrot, she said. Now, she just wants her fifth grader and kindergartner to be able to stay at Will-Moore and not move schools.

"Honestly, Rita Murphy is closer to where I live," she said. But, in two years, she will have a child at Bismarck High School, Wachter Middle School and, hopefully, one at Will-Moore, because it would be easier to drive them to school. Although Lincoln students can be bused to school, Gieser is like many Lincoln parents who drive their children to school.

As the question and answer period continued, stronger emotions came through in the comments, and some people sounded on the verge of yelling out what they thought. Some parents who had spoken out against the original two boundary proposals for Sunrise were apologizing to Lincoln parents that they were included in the latest proposals.

The original two proposals for Sunrise's boundaries included an area immediately around the new school and then the northern boundary of Northridge. The difference between the proposals was the northern boundary of Northridge being at 57th Avenue or Highway 1804.

Some parents from the Northridge area did not want to be moved to the new school, while some parents near the new school wanted to be included in the new school's boundaries, but were not under the two proposals.

In response to accommodating more families near the new elementary school, a third and fourth proposal were created that would take more students out of the Murphy attendance area and put them into Sunrise's attendance area. The new school, however, is not large enough to include all those families, plus the families targeted from Northridge for the new school.

This posed a problem for the district meeting its original intentions for the new elementary school, which was to decrease the size of Murphy and Northridge elementary schools. Both schools have more than 700 students, and the board wants to keep schools closer to a maximum capacity of 500 students.

The third and fourth proposals accomplish the board's goal of decreasing enrollment at both schools by moving part of Northridge's attendance area to Will-Moore instead of Sunrise.

This move, though, could make Will-Moore overcrowded. One way to lessen that possibility would be to move Lincoln students from Will-Moore to Murphy.

The board neither made a decision on the boundaries at the informational meeting nor at the school board meeting that proceeded the informational meeting. The board hopes to have boundaries set by the end of the year in time for kindergarten registration in January.

Information on the proposals and a slide show presentation on frequently asked questions will be available on the district's Web site, www.bismarckschools.org. Comments can also be directed to the school board members through their e-mail addresses listed on the district's Web site.

(Reach reporter Sara Kincaid at 250-8251 or sara.kincaid@bismarcktribune.com.)