News Briefs: Catch up on school and local news

Local construction companies Monarch Build and JE Dunn have begun the finishing touches on the Canadian Pacific Kansas City stadium — the first women’s sports stadium in the world.

Monarch owner and East parent Courtney Kounkel is impressed with her crew’s ability to stay ahead of schedule as they remain on track for their official opening for the Kansas City Current’s home opener this March.

“We’re trying to push up the schedule a bit in order to get some temporary certificates of occupancy before the end of this year,” Kounkel said.

These certificates are part of the logistics that must be completed before the official opening of the stadium in February.

Current fans like junior Henry Duchene look forward to seeing the stadium finally completed.

“I think it’s cool how interested people are in the stadium,” Duchene said. “I’ll be excited to finally see what [the stadium] looks like when the season starts.”

The new stadium will provide an immersive experience for fans. Every seat will be placed no more than 100 feet from the field.

“When you experience a soccer game, it’s important to be really in the game,” Kounkel said. “Everything is about being closer to the pitch, closer to the players and closer to the match so you can experience the game at a higher level.”

The venue will accommodate not only the women’s team, but also American football, rugby, lacrosse and various concerts.

“The goal of the ownership team is to really have this have the stadium be a community asset,” Kounkel said. “There are so many ways this stadium can be activated so that it’s a Kansas City community asset.”

The SMSD school board will hold their last meeting of the year on Dec. 4 for parents and community members’ to discuss upcoming changes to the district’s open enrollment policy — allowing students to transfer to Shawnee Mission school from out of the district

HB-2567, which included the statewide open enrollment policy, was signed into law by Governor Laura Kelly on May 16. The new law would allow students grades K-12 to attend any school within Kansas, including East, as long as they live in Kansas.

Currently, there’s no official change in place from the previous open enrollment program for incoming students as administrators prepare for state legislation’s new policy according to Principal Jason Peres.

“I’m assuming that when they are close to completion, they will ask for our input,” Peres said. “I imagine [principals and administrators] will all reconvene and talk about it, finalize it, then push it out by January.”

This policy will be a change from the previous program, which required students to pay an application fee before transferring to East, along with adhering to certain academic standards.

“I’m not aware that there will be a fee in place once open enrollment happens because this will just be a state law that any kid could go anywhere,” Peres said. “But we will have some sort of a process to dictate who comes [to East] next year.”

Junior Maren Dickerson, who transferred to East’s district in kindergarten, is thankful for the lifting of restrictions and the new policy opening up more opportunities for students.

“[Before], I couldn’t miss a certain amount of days [compared to] other people,” Dickerson said. “I have to get better grades than other people just because, and I had to keep up to a certain academic standard, or else I could lose my [enrollment exception].”

Dickerson hopes the new changes won’t just make life easier for current transfer students, but also allow others to make their own academic choices regarding their education.

“It’s great, I think that it shouldn’t matter where you live,” Dickerson said. “I think it should matter what school that you think you can fit into well, and you can thrive there.”

This law will impact all major districts in Kansas including Olathe, Kansas City, Kansas and Blue Valley, according to KMBC news and will be put into place when students begin to enroll for the 2024-2025 school year.