Jeffco is recommending closing two Okay-8 faculties this 12 months

Jeffco, Colorado’s second largest faculty district, is recommending the closure of two Okay-8 faculties because the district continues to handle the decline in pupil enrollment. 

Sixteen elementary faculties had been closed final 12 months within the first spherical of the district’s closure plan. 

The 2 faculties, Coal Creek Canyon Okay-8 and Arvada Okay-8, are the smallest of 5 Okay-8s in Jeffco Public Colleges. Coal Creek, which is situated close to the Boulder County border and has fewer than 100 college students, can also be smaller than any of the district’s 17 center faculties.

The proposed closure of Coal Creek Okay-8, nevertheless, will embody a seek for a constitution faculty supplier that will reopen locally. 

The Jeffco faculty board obtained the advice Thursday, however will vote on the proposed closures at its Oct. 12 assembly. There will likely be 4 school-based group conferences and two formal one-hour public hearings with the college board earlier than the vote. 

If accredited, the newest closures would convey the variety of faculties closed in Jeffco to 21 since 2021. 

Earlier than final 12 months’s elementary faculty closures, the district mentioned their buildings had the capability to serve 96,000 college students, however had been solely stuffed with about 69,000. With the closures thus far, the district now has the capability for about 88,000 college students, and is at the moment serving about 66,500.

Because of declining start charges and fewer kids residing within the space, the variety of college students coming into elementary faculties just isn’t changing the bigger group of scholars graduating and exiting the district.

Because the district considers secondary faculty enrollment, the board has already determined to shut Moore Center Faculty on the finish of this faculty 12 months. The college will merge with Pomona Excessive Faculty, which can serve college students in grades six by 12.

The 2 Okay-8 closures would impression about 524 college students and 97 employees members. The district estimates 26 of the scholars impacted have additionally been displaced by a earlier faculty closure. 

District leaders say they’ll must intently proceed to observe enrollment traits, however up to now, aren’t planning for a 3rd spherical of closures subsequent 12 months. A moratorium on highschool closures continues to be in impact till June 2024.

A extra sophisticated proposal for Coal Creek

Lisa Relou, chief of technique and communications for Jeffco, mentioned this spherical of suggestions was extra sophisticated, partly as a result of these secondary faculties aren’t situated as shut to one another as elementary faculties. 

District leaders mentioned they visited the Coal Creek Canyon group within the spring and heard that households are considering small faculties inside their close-knit group. At present, the closest Jeffco faculty, Three Creeks Okay-8, is greater than 10 occasions bigger with greater than 1,000 college students, and roughly 10 miles, or a 15-minute drive away. The college does have room for the Coal Creek college students.

However, “it’ll be a big change for these households,” Relou mentioned. 

The district plans to seek for constitution suppliers keen to open a college within the space. Regardless, the center faculty grades will shut on the finish of the college 12 months, if the closure is accredited. But when the district receives curiosity, then the closure of the elementary grades will likely be delayed for one more 12 months whereas the constitution utility is taken into account.

If no viable suppliers present curiosity within the subsequent month, then the total faculty will shut on the finish of this faculty 12 months. 

Coal Creek’s constructing can accommodate 200 college students, however in that canyon group, Relou mentioned, a college doubtless won’t ever have that many college students. The best enrollment the district has on document for the college was in 2013-14 with 159 college students.

“There are constitution faculties on the market designed to serve a small variety of college students,” Relou mentioned. “It’s simply not sustainable as a Jeffco conventional faculty.”

As a conventional faculty, Jeffco not solely provides Coal Creek the best funding per pupil of any faculty within the district, however has additionally backed the college with an extra $469,468 within the final 12 months.

Within the meantime, district leaders are additionally researching how different districts subsidize small faculties, and say they’re open to contemplating a transportation association with neighboring districts that will have a extra enticing faculty possibility for Coal Creek households. 

Final faculty 12 months, greater than a 3rd of Coal Creek’s college students got here from exterior Jeffco boundaries. 

The proposed Arvada Okay-8 closure

Arvada Okay-8 was advised final faculty 12 months that it was being thought of for closure as a result of it’s on the state’s watchlist for years of low efficiency, however finally it was chosen due to its low and declining enrollment, and complex boundary placement, district officers mentioned.

At present, Arvada Okay-8 has roughly 557 college students. Of these, 86% qualify totally free or reduced-price lunch, a measure of poverty. 

Final 12 months, the college had 550 college students together with 351 who lived within the neighborhood. However one other 581 Okay-8 college students who lived within the faculty boundary selected to go to a special faculty. Of these, 135 went to constitution faculties, whereas the bulk went to different Jeffco faculties. 

Arvada Okay-8 is the one Okay-8 within the district that has separate boundaries for elementary and center faculty college students. 

Nonetheless, the college isn’t even inside its personal elementary boundary.

And, as a result of it has separate boundaries, the college additionally serves as a separate center faculty, as a substitute of a Okay-8, which means that it takes a big variety of new college students at sixth grade who’ve been by conventional elementary faculties.

If the college is accredited to shut, the district would redraw the world boundaries permitting North Arvada Center Faculty to absorb the entire sixth by eighth grade college students, and elementary college students can be redrawn right into a boundary to attend Lawrence Elementary. The district additionally notes that close by Swanson and Secrest elementaries have area to accommodate college students who as a substitute need to use the selection enrollment course of to attend these faculties. 

College students within the particular wants program, known as the Vital Help Wants Heart Program, can be relocated to the Pomona 6-12 within the 2024-25 faculty 12 months. 

The district is estimating there will likely be renovation prices of as much as $500,000 at North Arvada Center Faculty, and about $675,000 at Lawrence Elementary if the newest proposed closures are accredited.

Yesenia Robles is a reporter for Chalkbeat Colorado protecting Okay-12 faculty districts and multilingual schooling. Contact Yesenia at yrobles@chalkbeat.org.