A standing-room-only crowd almost entirely composed of supporters of Monocacy Elementary School filled a Board of Education public hearing last week to plead their case for not shutting down the school.

Montgomery County Public Schools Superintendent Jerry D. Weast announced Oct. 23 his recommendation to close the Dickerson school and consolidate it with Poolesville Elementary by August due to projected enrollment declines at both schools. The Board of Education is scheduled to vote Thursday on whether to approve the proposed closure and consolidation procedures.

Parents said they are not being given enough time to participate in the process and the school system has not provided sufficient evidence of why the school should be closed, and they asked the board to consider alternatives to increase enrollment in the rural cluster.

"[Monocacy] is a close-knit family and central to the surrounding community," Monocacy PTA President Dawn Albert said. "The school is academically and socially successful and has been for 50 years. Such a success should be applauded, not have its doors closed."

The Montgomery County Council of Parent Teacher Associations is concerned that the proposed closure procedures do not provide enough time for adequate community input or consideration of the recommendation's implications, President Kay Romero wrote in her testimony to the board.

Parents have sent the school system a Maryland Public Information Act request to learn more about the recommendation, Poolesville Cluster coordinator Sarah Defnet said.

"You, the elected members of the board, need to know that the distrust felt in our extended community about the manner in which this decision was reached and communicated is palpable," Barbara Davidson of Barnesville, parent of a former Monocacy student, said.

Parents said they are concerned Poolesville Elementary could become overcrowded with students from Monocacy and because of future development in Poolesville, which school planners did not factor into the cluster's six-year enrollment projections. If students from both schools were at Poolesville Elementary this school year, the facility would be at 102 percent capacity.

Boardmember Laura Berthiaume asked whether Poolesville Elementary would be a priority if and when it needs a four- to six-room addition as anticipated in Weast's recommendation.

"We'll have to get back to you on that because it will depend on how overcrowded other schools are at the time," said Joseph Lavorgna, acting director of facilities management

The Clarksburg cluster would support a liberal transfer policy allowing interested Clarksburg students to attend Monocacy, Cluster coordinator Donna Pfeiffer said.

The Clarksburg Cluster also testified about the proposed budget. Highlights from the cluster coordinator's testimony on Superintendent Jerry D. Weast's recommended fiscal 2011 capital budget and fiscal 2011-2016 Capital Improvements Program are as follows.

Clarksburg

-Supports building a classroom addition at Clarksburg High; building a new middle school; conducting a boundary study on whether to reassign Lois P. Rockwell Elementary students to John T. Baker Middle; and implementing a liberal transfer policy for Clarksburg students to repopulate the Poolesville cluster.

-Concerns include overcrowding at Rocky Hill Middle and a lack of receptacles for feminine hygiene products in elementary school girls' bathrooms.