Fort Zumwalt Asking for Mobile Classroom for Mt. Hope Elementary

At Thursday night's O'Fallon Planning and Zoning Commission meeting, Fort Zumwalt School District plans to ask for approval for a temporary classroom at Mt. Hope Elementary School.

Patch spoke to Patty Corum, Deputy Superintendent, and she said that the school has been at capacity for a while. "Now, we're just tipping over it," she said.

The school has been able to shuffle classrooms around and make do, but this current "bubble" in enrollment requires that a first grade classroom be added.

Corum said that the building's principal hasn't yet decided which students will be using the mobile classroom, but she said that she didn't expect it to be the first graders.

Enrollment elsewhere in the district was flat, she said, and there was no need for temporary classrooms at other schools.

The proposed mobile classroom is a 1,152 square foot trailer that will be placed behind the existing school and which will be screened by mature vegetation on the west property line.

A sidewalk is proposed to connect the school with the temporary classroom.

The district will have to update the Planning and Zoning Commission if the trailer stays longer than a year. The school district must also get a building permit and a temporary use permit, as well as approval from the O'Fallon Fire Department.