Northside Independent School District officials are weighing their options to deal with a $38 million deficit and projections that student enrollment will continue to drop.
Reaching its peak enrollment in 2019 with more than 107,800 students, NISD’s current enrollment sits at 97,600, having lost several students to nearby charter schools, homeschooling and population changes. The decline is a major driver of the district’s deficit because Texas funds public schools based on enrollment and attendance.
While NISD has made competitive moves to boost enrollment — recently opening its boundaries to all students in the Bexar County area and planning a virtual high school for next year — it’s likely to keep losing students for reasons out of its control.
Population growth is shifting outward and fewer people are buying homes in San Antonio. Those who do move toward the city’s center tend to have few or no babies.
“You can’t educate an unborn child,” said Jo Ann Fey, deputy superintendent for administration during a January meeting where she laid out the first stages of a “district optimization” plan to save NISD some money.
School districts are also bracing for the effect that the new Texas education savings accounts program could have on student enrollment because they give families the chance to use public dollars for private school tuition.
What is school optimization?
NISD has several under-enrolled campuses. The number of campuses serving less than 350 students increased from two to 10 since 2018. Campuses with less than 500 students went from 12 to 43. Overall, the district operates 133 schools.
Meanwhile, charter school enrollment quadrupled in the area since 2012.
“We have many more schools serving a lot less kids than we had in 2020,” Fey said.
It’s a common misconception that smaller schools are better for students, Fey explained, but it’s more expensive to keep a small campus running compared to a campus with more students.
That’s why NISD is looking for ways to be more efficient; officials are currently crafting an “optimization” plan which could involve consolidating campuses.
But Fey said optimization doesn’t have to solely be about closing schools. It could mean expanding or adding new student programs and redesigning campuses to attract and retain students. It could also mean rezoning within NISD to balance enrollment.
For now, district staff will develop “campus profiles” outlining a school’s unique demographics. That could mean academics, culture surveys, attendance rates and other data points the school board wants to prioritize.
NISD also plans on launching an optimization website, sending out surveys, holding town halls and taking feedback from advisory groups.
Staff plan to make optimization recommendations to the board in November and start implementing them by December.
“The consolidation piece of the conversation is real,” said Superintendent John Craft. “But it’s not the only part.”
Tax rate elections
NISD is anticipating going out for a bond and voter approved tax rate election, or VATRE, this November.
While it hasn’t been approved by the board, officials say NISD could go for a $400 million bond election that would focus on “definite needs” like heating and cooling infrastructure projects and security vestibules. These monies would come from NISD’s interest in sinking rate, which can only be used to pay for capital investments.
At the same time, NISD could go out for a VATRE that would unlock an extra $45 million a year through the state’s complicated “golden penny” funding mechanism. These funds would be pulled from the district’s maintenance and operations tax rate, which funds everyday costs like salaries and supplies and could go a long way toward cutting NISD’s budget deficit.
Currently, NISD’s I&S rate is slightly over 33 cents for every $100 of taxable property value, and the M&O rate is about 67 cents. This means taxpayers in NISD pay about $1 for every $100 of taxable property value they own that doesn’t fall under one of the state’s several tax exemptions.
NISD voters last passed a bond package in 2022 for $992 million that included building a new elementary school, major renovations to facilities, HVAC purchases, new tech for campus safety and new school buses. The district has never gone out for a VATRE, however.
If NISD does put these tax measures on November’s ballot, officials say the proposals would keep the current tax rate “flat.” The district’s tax rate has not increased in several years, instead gradually decreasing since 2019, when the rate was nearly $1.40.
