*Dumbarton will have four portable buildings (which Fink prefers to call "learning cottages") next year to make up for the five second-floor classrooms that fourth-graders will use. 

The school had such buildings during its renovation a couple years ago, Fink said, and the electric meter is still there and ready for use. Two health teachers, a couple math teachers and a social studies teacher will be making the move to the portables.

*Dumbarton's capacity is 1200, and its current population is well below that, at about 950, Fink said. So there aren't really any concerns about overcrowding there, even with the incoming fourth-graders.

"We have lots of room," Fink said. And plenty of lockers, too.

*Fink emphasized that she and other school officials have worked hard to ensure there's "little interaction - if any - between fourth-graders and middle-school students," responding to (elementary) parent concerns on that score.  Rodgers Forge kids begin their day an hour after Dumbarton does, and will be moving about when the middle-school students are either in class or at lunch, Fink said.

Finally: Tomorrow evening, Rodgers Forge parents can take a tour of Dumbarton and see the space where their children will be this fall.  Middle school students will be their guides.