School closure discussions still a topic in Olympia

Note: This is part four in a series of articles about the Olympia School District Board of Directors’ Summer Retreat at North Mason School District in Belfair on Saturday, Aug. 10.

In addition to a debriefing on the contentious issue of school closures, how it played out during the 2023-24 school year, and board members’ feelings about it, the Olympia School District Board of Directors discussed what factors might trigger a relaunch of school closures talks.

Board Vice President Scott Clifthorne, who planned and led the meeting, explained that the purpose of the conversation was not to resume discussing closing schools, nor was it to finalize criteria that would resume the conversation. He added that it was not even to identify which specific schools could potentially face the chopping block.

“We're not here to seek resolution on this today, but we do need to begin the conversation about what we're monitoring, to decide whether to restart our school closure conversation,” Clifthorne explained. “The conversation about which schools would close is a different one. We’re just talking about what would happen to necessitate resuming that conversation.”

Clifthorne summarized the background that led to the board’s discussion during the retreat.

“We had this moment at the end of April where the long conversation that we had as a group of leaders and administration and community about school closures resulted in us saying it’s off the table,” Clifthorne added. “And in the context of that conversation, we also said that part of the work going forward was doing work on developing a shared analysis ... on a go-forward basis, what are the triggers that would cause us to even dream of having this conversation again?”

Clifthorne admitted that the matter is a work session matter. The board did not finish the discussion and agreed to continue during scheduled board work sessions this autumn.

Clifthorne listed eight categories: enrollment, budget, and six student outcomes for Inclusionary Practices as a framework for developing these criteria. 

1. Enrollment
2. Budget
3. Outcome 1: Be compassionate and kind.
4. Outcome 2: Have the academic and life skills to pursue their individual career, civic, and educational goals.
5. Outcome 3: Advocate for the social, physical and mental wellness of themselves and others and be hopeful about the future.
6. Outcome 4: Have the skills, knowledge, and courage to identify and confront personal, systemic, and social bias.
7. Outcome 5: Discover their passions, be curious and love learning.
8. Outcome 6: Be critical thinkers who contribute to and collaborate with our local, global, and natural world.

Directors urged to look for other solutions

Clifthorne asked if anyone wanted to take the position that closing schools should never happen. Director Maria Flores replied that while she would not say that there would never be a need to close schools, she urged her colleagues to look for other solutions to the financial and enrollment issues than going straight to closure. For instance, she recommended connecting programs with other funding sources, including early learning in all elementary schools.

Board President Hilary Seidel replied, “Those are ideas, but not necessarily metrics.” She added that “there are already parts of our district that are fairly remote, that are not served by a neighborhood school, and so I just want to acknowledge that for those families, they are already being bused in.”

Clifthorne added that “to drive from the far tip of Summit Lake to Boston Harbor Elementary, that trip is approximately five miles further than you drove today to get here,” to the North Mason School District Office in Belfair.

According to Google Maps, the drive from the far tip of Summit Lake to Boston Harbor Elementary School is 21.6 miles, while the drive from the Olympia School District Office to the North Mason School District Office is 43.5 miles. Further, OSD has several elementary schools that are much closer to Summit Lake than Boston Harbor Elementary School. 

Enrollment dropped by more than 10%

Regarding enrollment’s impact on schools and the closure discussion, Clifthorne stated, “we dropped from a high of a little over 10,000 students to our headcount this last year, which was just a little under 9,000 – so 1,000, 10%. And at the end of the road, decided not to close school[s].”

Clifthorne posited that enrollment impacts the budget. A decline in enrollment means less funding for the district. 

“It's not a decline in revenue; our total revenue has grown. So our revenue didn't decline, but it's a decline relative to what our revenue increase would have been had we maintained a 10,000-student enrollment,” Clifthorne said.

Director Darcy Huffman suggested that in her estimation, it would not be just one factor that would trigger discussing school closures.

“So it is not, I can't look at enrollment and say, ‘okay, if the enrollment gets here, then I think we should close schools.’ I think that there has to be the opportunity and the ability for us to have to serve our students,” Huffman commented.

Huffman added that for example, if enrollment were to drop to 8,000 but “we could still serve them all well and give them all the opportunities that they should have,” then she wouldn’t consider closure. But if the district reached the point where it could not meet all its goals for the students, that would be the time for discussing closure.

Huffman also stated that having small schools is great, but it is also important to have reasonable class sizes.

Clifthorne replied that the district has saved money by increasing class sizes. Yet when a school lacks enough students to have a full class in one grade and must combine grades (such as a 4^th-5^th grade combined class), it indicates that school closure might be needed.

Student representative Sovana Roberts, attending the meeting via an online link, suggested that when “fundamental administration and staff start seeming to get cut to half days, I think that that’s when it's appropriate to start thinking about closing schools.”

Other metrics

Flores stated that she wants an analysis of student populations. “So, some of this was done by some of the consultants, by analyzing the enrollment and admission process, but also distribution, neighborhood schools, essential programs, transfers between different schools, and the total population by race, ethnicity, low income, multilingual, students with disabilities, gender, homeless, foster care, and migrants.” She wants this analysis to happen before reopening discussion of school closures.

Seidel mentioned Outcome 5 in terms of school closures.

“So our ninth grade on track goal that we had is by spring 2026 we will increase the percentage of students passing all classes in their ninth grade year from 78.4% to 85%, with an emphasis on students who identify as black and African American, which I think, if I remember correctly, has to do with that that being the greatest disproportionality in that subgroup,” Seidel said.

“And so we have a goal of achieving that by 2026; so for example, this year, when we get the outcome five monitoring report, if we're not on track to achieve that goal. Let's say we've not made any increase, and we look at what the trajectory is, and we're not get we're not likely to get there.”

Flores remarked that several measures, including keeping ninth graders on track, contribute to schools receiving more Title I money from the state.

The board ran out of time at the retreat, so it agreed to continue the discussion during board work sessions this autumn.