But those most affected by a split - after all the talk about politics, power and taxes is over - may be people like 12-year-old Christopher Duffy.

His dad wants the autistic boy to attend a special program that one day may be in another district if the Jordan School District divides. And he wonders if the program will survive at all.

"The whole conversation seems to be about the bottom line as far as taxes are concerned," said Jack Duffy, a government teacher at West Jordan High School. "I can understand, but that should not be the only focus."

As the campaign ramps up to split from Jordan, the emphasis at the political level has been far more about money than student achievement and opportunity, critics say. Teachers have been surveyed about their thoughts, but many have no idea what a split would mean for their classrooms.

Whether education will improve depends on who you ask. Teachers worry the fallout from a split may be larger classes and fewer programs on the west side. On both sides of the river, some teachers say a smaller district could mean a more attuned leadership.

East-side city officials say a new study verifies that academics would not be affected, but it was not intended to be a road map for dividing the district.

"You almost have to live to see what it's going to do," said Joan Richards, a fifth-grade teacher at Herriman Elementary.

Pros and cons:

The hunger to create smaller school districts became readily apparent in the past several years when schools on the east side of the Salt Lake Valley with declining enrollments began to close. Parents, some already frustrated by what they perceived as dwindling services and exploding class size, felt ignored by district administrators and school boards. When a 2006 law made it possible for smaller cities and unincorporated areas to band together to form new administrations, the small school district movement was officially born.

As communities contemplate forming new districts, the law requires that feasibility studies be conducted to analyze any split. Two recently released studies on Jordan and Granite district splits say division would be feasible, but offer various caveats.

Most importantly, the remaining west-side portion of the Granite district may struggle. The district currently taxes at the highest level state law allows, and the west side would need more money. Some say the east side of the district would eventually face school closures.

In Jordan's case, if the east broke from the west, west-side residents could pay up to about $200 more on average for a $300,000 house than if the district stayed intact. East-side residents would see their tax payment decline.

Not surprisingly, the future of Granite and Jordan is an east side vs. west side issue in the minds of many.

But in Jordan, at least, educators' and even some parents' opinions are not neatly divided by the Jordan River.

Interviews with people on both sides of the district suggest a potential vote may not have a predictable outcome. East-siders, even at the same school, view the issue differently. Complicating the situation is the fact that some may live on one side and work on the other.

Marc Hunter, a teacher at Jordan High on the east side, relishes the thought of a split. A new, smaller east-side district would hopefully care about its teachers, he said, and a division could only help morale, badly hurt by cuts last year to retirement benefits and insurance cost increases.

"I don't know how the district expects teachers to be loyal . . . because we basically get treated like dirt," Hunter said.

Whoever lives in the boundaries of the proposed new district should be able to vote, he said.

Down the corridor, Jordan High marketing teacher Wayne Dittmore sees the issue differently. Having worked in a smaller district with less support for specialized programs, he sees a split as potentially problematic.

"I guess I have a fear that programs right now that are successful for a few might be considered expensive for a district half this size," he said.

Not every teacher on the west side fears a split. Bigger can mean too big in the mind of Katie Blunt, a sixth-grade teacher at Herriman Elementary, who thinks Jordan is trying to do too much at once.

But many west-side teachers see only the negatives from a divide. They wonder if money for teacher training could go down as a new west-side district struggles to pay for overcrowding and new schools. It doesn't seem fair, said Jana Brinton, a world languages teacher at Bingham High.

"It's public education," she said. "It's not 'my child got a better education than your child because of power and money.' "

Michelle Jorgensen, a first-grade teacher at Herriman Elementary, thinks a split would become a constitutional problem under the 14th Amendment. Someone could challenge it as discriminatory because the "have-mores" will take their money while the other side is left behind to struggle.

Teachers feel this is about the east-side residents not wanting to pay for the west side's growth, she said.

"I've heard them deny it's money, but I know [very] well that's the reason," she said.

The money

A study can only project so much, so perhaps it makes sense that a large part of the analysis of the Jordan district split focuses on money. Dollars can be quantified.

Future education impact is harder to measure.

Cottonwood Heights Mayor Kelvyn Cullimore defends the message in the study.

"What the consultant found was that he could find no reason programs currently being offered in the district as a whole couldn't be offered in each of the divided districts," he said. "The reason there weren't more details is because there were not problems found."

Some staffing issues may need to be addressed and some programs temporarily shared, he said. Dividing the district would be an opportunity to make changes and "cherry pick" the best ideas.

Nevertheless, Jordan Superintendent Barry Newbold said there has been too little focus on what a split could mean for schools and learning.

"In my opinion, that's where the majority of our focus should be," he said. "Because if this doesn't result in the same or improved educational services to children, then we're focused on the wrong thing."

Parents pushing for smaller districts in Utah say research supports their belief that a smaller district would mean smaller schools, smaller class size, a more personal education and greater parental influence over school boards.

According to the study, east-side schools may eventually shrink in size due to lower enrollment, leading to smaller class size as well. Schools on the west side will grow.

Specialty schools that currently exist on one side of the district could initially be shared, but for the most part would eventually need to be replicated, the study states.

The report suggests that the overall success of students will continue because students will continue to be successful at their individual schools.

"What system has to be in place to maintain those level of services?" Newbold said. "The report is silent on that."

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* JULIA LYON can be contacted at jlyon@sltrib.com or 801-257-8748.