Hearings to be held on moving schools

DeKalb County school officials next month will hold public hearings about moving two schools to different campuses. One of the schools is the Heritage Center off Briarcliff Road in north DeKalb that may then become home to a new first-of-its-kind military-style public high school.

Both moves have been discussed before by school officials. The other move includes the years-in-the-making relocation of Elizabeth Andrews High School — formerly Open Campus — from North Druid Hills Road to a newly renovated building in Stone Mountain.

The Heritage Center is a former elementary school that currently hosts students with special needs. Those students next year will merge with another special needs program at the system’s Margaret Harris school.

With the Heritage site expected to be vacant, system officials are considering placing there the new DeKalb Marine Corps Institute. The proposed high school, which is under negotiation, would be a partnership with the U.S. Marines and include 650 ninth- through 12th-graders in a military-style program.

However, several neighbors have suggested in e-mails and on blogs that the former elementary campus is too small and otherwise ill-suited for the proposed program.

The public hearing about the Heritage Center’s move is scheduled for April 14 at the campus, 2225 Heritage Dr. in Atlanta. The second public hearing about the move of Elizabeth Andrews High School is scheduled for April 16 at the campus, 2415 N. Druid Hills Rd. in Atlanta.

Both hearings start at 6:30 p.m.