We've got new principals tonight for the East Wake School of Integrated Technology, West Lake Middle School and Lake Myra Elementary.

Jamee O. Lynch will now run the East Wake School of Integrated Technology in Wendell, replacing the departing Kristin Cuilla. It's one of four small schools on the East Wake High campus.

Lynch has been principal of Sanford Creek Elementary in Rolesville since 2007. Before then, she was Wake's principal of the year when she was at Hodge Road Elementary in Knightdale.

UPDATE

See bio sheets at end of post. 

The school board just voted 6-2 to approve the reassignment plan.

Unlike previous years, most board members chose not to speak before casting the vote. Board member Ron Margiotta and Beverley Clark tried to explain their no votes.

Margiotta accused the board of engaging in social engineering.

Clark asked that the board delay the vote a week to see if the state Supreme Court ruled on the year-round case.

The grandfathering vote was done separately and was passed unanimously.

Here's some numbers on the latest version of the reassignment plan.

The plan would move 24,654 students over the next three years, down from 25,486 students in the proposal released to the school board in December.

The breakdown works out to 9,547 students for this upcoming school year, 10,489 students in 2010-11 and 4,618 kids in 2011-12.

You can call this a compromise or a game of chicken, but the school board is only willing to pay a little more than half the $1.4 million cost for road work near Panther Creek High School.

The school board voted 5-4 this afternoon to authorize its leadership to negotiate with Cary to pay up to $750,000 for the road improvements. The inability to work out a deal has blocked the use of 22 modular classrooms on Panther Creek's campus.

"This is not how our funds are supposed to be used," said school board member Beverley Clark, who proposed the $750,000. "Our funds are supposed to be used to build schools."

It looks like the school board has agreed to make at least one more change to the reassignment plan.

During today's work session, Kevin Hill, the board vice chairman, asked that they not move nodes 233.4 and 233.5 from Fox Road Elementary to Wakefield Elementary.

None of the board members objected. But rather than voting during the work session, Rosa Gill, the board chairwoman, said they might as well do it this afternoon during the vote on the full plan.

The three-year reassignment plan that the school board is scheduled to vote on this afternoon is looking like a multi-year plan in name only.

County staffers told county commissioners at this weekend's retreat that the money isn't there to fund all the new construction projects unless taxes are raised. So, barring a tax increase, some school or other capital projects could be delayed.

Any delays to the renovations at Wake Forest-Rolesville High or the construction of H6 would cause major changes to the reassignment plan. Both projects are among the biggest items needing cash this year from the county.

Like taxes, it seems that class-size waivers have become an inevitable fact of life.

The school board will vote Tuesday on approving K-3 waivers for 31 classes in 10 elementary schools. As with past requests, year-round schools account for a majority of the schools on the list.

In a lot of cases, teacher assistants are being used at those schools to reduce the ratio of adults to children.

Are we reaching the point now that parental anger over reassignment could lead to major changes in the school system?

As noted in today's article, there are a whole lot of groups around who want to change the school system. Many of them will meet Thursday at 6 p.m. at Holly Springs Town Hall to see if they can find common ground.

"The more you impact, the more you'll alienate," said Kathleen Brennan, co-founder of Wake CARES. "At some point you'll reach the saturation point. Whether that's been reached remains to be seen."

A person who recorded Wednesday's work sesssion graciously forwarded me the audio of school board member Beverley Clark's take on the Lacy-Stough reassignments.

You'll hear her reasons for backing the moves to Stough and more about her talk with her SAS researcher friend. 

Clark's decision not to push for a reconsideration pretty much took it out of play. Board members are reluctant to push for a change in another member's district if that person isn't on board.

The dffierence is shown from 2006 when Clark helped push for those nodes not to be moved from Lacy to Stough.

School and Cary leaders will meet Monday to try to resolve the impasse over road improvements near Panther Creek High School that have blocked the use of 22 needed modular classrooms.

Rosa Gill, chairwoman of the school board, and Kevin Hill, vice chairman of the school board, will have a private meeting with Cary Mayor Harold Weinbrecht. They'll discuss Cary's requirement that Wake construct an additional northbound through lane on N.C. 55 from McCrimmon Parkway through the intersections of the ramps at N.C. 540.

The problem is that it doesn't look like either side will give in on the road work, which Cary is requiring before Wake can use the modulars.