The Edgewood Independent School District board of trustees voted 5-1 Tuesday to accept a recommendation to close Winston Intermediate School of Excellence and Wrenn Middle School. The vote came despite emotional last-minute calls by parents, students and community members to keep the campuses open.
Trustees Richard Santoyo, Luis Gomez, Frank Espinosa, Joseph M. Guerra and James Hernandez voted for the proposal, while Mike Valdez voted no. Board President Martha Castilla did not attend the meeting; she was hospitalized at the beginning of the week, according to an announcement made at the start of the session.
Valdez tried to amend the proposal to consolidate Gardendale Early Learning and Winston, but without a second the proposal was not voted on.
The move comes a day after San Antonio Independent School District trustees moved to close 15 schools due to enrollment declines.
In Edgewood ISD, a far smaller district on the West Side, enrolled students occupy only 50% of the district’s overall capacity, according to data obtained through an open records request and presented by district officials at a handful of community meetings in recent weeks leading up to the vote.
Declining enrollment trends stretch back decades but have been hastened in recent years by growing competition from other districts and public charter schools as well as a decline in birth rates and an aging population, according to district officials. In addition, attendance has fallen from 93% before the pandemic to 85% after, affecting the amount of state funding the district receives.
Enrollment at almost half the schools is now at less than 50%, with the district’s overall enrollment dipping below 8,000 for the first time this year.
“Schools are not the buildings … they are the people in them, the teachers, the students,” Trustee James Hernandez said before the vote. “We’re not getting rid of schools — we just have to shift and adjust.”
Winston Intermediate School of Excellence serves third through fifth grades and focuses on subjects like computer coding and robotics. But the campus is operating at only about 30% of its capacity. The school is operated under a partnership with Texas A&M University-San Antonio.
Salvador Hector Ochoa, the president of TAMU-SA, said in a statement shared with the San Antonio Report that the institution will support whatever decisions the school board makes and will “continue to do everything in our power … to enhance the success of our local ISDs.”
“The topic of school closures is always a very difficult one for any community,” he said. “These are challenging but necessary conversations that several San Antonio-area school districts are having.”
Wrenn, on the other hand, is at 73% of its capacity, the highest of any school in the district. But other factors were also considered, including the age of the building and the cost of renovations.
Before the vote, trustee Joseph Guerra gave a warning about what would happen if changes did not occur, given the trajectory of the district.
“A no vote will lead to a future where Edgewood ISD no longer exists,” he said. “As board members we have taken an oath to be responsible for all … 8,000 students … that are currently in district schools.”
Timothy Cortez, a student that attends Winston, spoke to board members in Spanish before the vote, asking them not to close the school.
“We have a very good principal who helps us every day and every year,” he said. “We don’t want you to close our school because we are also close by.”
He pointed to teachers in the audience, saying how much they have helped him.
A portion of his comments were read by a district staff member in English.
Agapita Jaramillo, a member of the task force formed in August to explore school closures, repeated concerns that questions were left unanswered and said not all of the recommendations the task force produced were presented to the public.
The district last month issued 11 initial recommendations that included a variety of closure and merger scenarios, but Jaramillo said the task force had produced 18.
“The task force was supposed to appear transparent,” she said. “But in reality, it was only there to support the decision that the superintendent and the board have already decided.”
Edgewood Superintendent Eduardo Hernández said before the vote that he heard the community, and recognized that the vote was the start of a “grieving process,” for the neighborhoods losing schools.
Valdez, who has been an outspoken critic of closing schools since the process began in August, questioned the superintendent before the vote about how many students at the schools slated for closure use district transportation and how many parents attended meetings of the task force that recommended the closures among other questions.
The transportation information was not readily available, according to to Hernández, and Trustee Richard Santoyo said 50 community members, including parents and district staff, were present at the first meeting.
A district official later said 22 people were present at the last meeting, mostly school staff members.
The questions Valdez asked were met with applause.
Hernández also rejected accusations by Valdez that the district prioritized Pre-K 4 SA, a city-run early childhood education provider that’s partnered with the district to operate Gardendale Early Learning Center. All schools were considered for closure throughout the process, Hernández added.
“Whether it is [Texas A&M-San Antonio], whether it is Pre-K 4 SA, we know that [district partners] are pouring hundred of thousands of dollars into [schools],” Hernández said. “That is money that they have been able to allot to the school.”
