It can be upsetting to have a carefully nurtured educational program transferred from a school building in one neighborhood to another school in a different neighborhood.

Much can go wrong during a move. The little things that make a classroom buzz with the excitement of learning can figuratively fall off the truck when trying to transplant them. Educational success can be lost among the changes that accompany a move to new facilities.

But what choice is there?

Seattle cannot continue to operate enough schools to educate 100,000 students when there are only about 46,000 students today. How can we demand efficiency and academic accomplishment of the public schools if parents are not willing to merge some schools and close others?

A frequent refrain is that we'd all be better off if the government were run more like business. What if the popularity of espresso dimmed and Starbucks had less than half as many customers as now? How patiently would Starbucks' stockholders wait for the company to close some of its stores before they would begin dumping their stock?

The popular educational program at Pathfinder K-8 School should keep up its good works. Perhaps moving it to the Boren School is not the best option.

Despite the potential for difficulties, past is prologue. After all, it was the ingenuity, flexibility and can-do attitude of teachers, administrators, parents, volunteers and students that created the programs everyone is afraid of losing now.

West Seattle's public schools community possesses those same powers today. Let's fire them up to meet this challenge.