The committee discussed the next steps in the school structure discussion.  The discussion included opinions on the removal and reasons to keep the 5th grade at SNS.  Reasons for removal included increasing class sizes in grades 6th - 8th to add additional Seaside students to the High School on an annual basis, to allow the 5th grade students to stay at Dune Lakes and Butler to be able to hold leadership roles as the older kids on campus, and to make room for additional students in each middle school class to allow more children to attend the school via the lottery. The reason for keeping the 5th grade included that our class testing scores have been outstanding,  our current teaching methods are developed around a 5th-8th-grade middle school, and the belief that the earlier we get students into SNS, the better they perform in later grades.  Lloyd commented that additional students moving from Seaside to Seacoast could go against our message that we have been presenting to legislators to add additional students to Seacoast to create further opportunity for Walton County students. 

The next steps include evaluating preference data for middle school students.  Tom Miller will send preference data to the committee for review.  The next meeting will be established within a week.  It was requested that additional board members be asked to come to the next committee for additional opinions on the topic.