KANNAPOLIS — By the 2002-2003 school year , the Kannapolis City Schools student population will have outgrown the space the system now has, even with schools turning rooms for subjects like art, music and computers into regular classrooms.

With the student population expected to grow by 27 percent in the next five years and four of the system’s seven schools exceeding capacity now, the Kannapolis City Schools Facilities Task Force recommends building at least one new school and expanding others by 2005.

The Kannapolis Board of Education will meet at 5:45 p.m. Thursday to review the task force’s findings.

The school board created the task force to study the school system’s growth and corresponding school construction needs through 2005.

The system already exceeds “state-standards” capacity of 3,958. That means some schools don’t have space for subjects like art and music, which are labeled “non-academic courses” though recommended by the state.

In some cases, schools also are exceeding state-recommended class sizes.

Comprised of current and retired system administrators, school board members, planners and others, the task force met between December and August.

The school board will review the report at the system’s administrative offices, 100 Denver St. The recommendations won’t be final until the board approves them, school system spokeswoman Ellen Boyd said.

The Kannapolis system has grown by more than 300 students in the last four years. At the end of the past school year, its enrollment was 4,263. The task force projects that the system’s student population will grow by another 1,168 students within five years to 5,431, with the most growth coming in the 2001-2002 school year.

“That kind of double-digit growth ... would simply overwhelm the current facilities of Kannapolis City Schools if the facilities situation is not addressed,” the report says.

The recommendations include:

• Build a new school to relieve the middle and elementary schools. It would have one middle school grade and one or more elementary grades initially. It could become the system’s second middle school, since there is no room for expansion on the Kannapolis Middle campus.
• Increase capacity by expanding the system’s elementary schools — each has room on its campus for expansion, and some already have expansion plans — and completing an unfinished wing at A.L. Brown High.

City and county planners arrived at the growth numbers using the number of residences existing, approved and expected to be built during the next five years.

They expect the system’s elementary population to increase by 539; middle school students by 211; and high school by 418, according to the report. Most of the elementary growth is anticipated to occur at Forest Park, which is expected to exceed capacity in 2002.

Among elementary schools, Fred L. Wilson and Shady Brook already exceed their capacity.

Shady Brook has even exceeded its “stress” capacity, the number of students a school can house if it converts all available space for academics.

Shady Brook exceeds its 184-student capacity by nearly 200 students, using state standards that recommend space for co-curricular activities like music and art. All of Shady Brook’s co-curricular rooms have been converted to classrooms, as have nearly all of the co-curricular rooms at Fred L. Wilson, the report says.

Capacity at both can be increased to around 500 through expansions, the report says. Forest Park, Jackson Park and Woodrow Wilson can be expanded to accommodate around 100 more students apiece.

A.L. Brown High School exceeded its state-standards capacity of 1,044 students by only 29 students at the end of last year. Enrollment there is expected to increase to 1,370 by 2001-2002 — exceeding the school’s stress capacity — and to 1,491 within five years.

Kannapolis Middle School was at stress capacity at the end of last year with 1,045 students, exceeding its intended capacity by more than 100 students, the report says.