This story has been updated.
The San Antonio Independent School District could be the next in the region to shutter schools with low enrollment in order to “rightsize” following years of declining enrollment and rising costs. But not before a months-long community engagement period that kicked off with a resolution passed Tuesday night that will end with a report and recommendations to the board on Nov. 13.
The superintendent and staff are tasked with analyzing 11 items in the coming months, including the life expectancy of buildings, projected enrollment, student dislocation, operating costs and staffing structures, before compiling a report to present to the board. The report could include options to close schools, co-locate separate schools to serve students on the same campus or consolidation of campuses into one school, according SAISD board president Christina Martinez.
Before they do that, however, they are required to present a decision framework to the district advisory committees and the public in a series of regional meetings. The district has been preparing for the possibility of this move since Jaime Aquino was hired as superintendent in 2022, according to interviews, including by taking field trips with district staff, parents and teachers to other districts that have closed schools in recent history.
Aquino has also said he has was watching the emotional and fraught processes undertaken by the South San Antonio and Harlandale independent school districts, which voted to close schools in recent months, informing the district’s game plan.
In a press conference following the meeting Tuesday, Aquino told reporters the district doesn’t “anticipate that this would have any significant impact to our instructional staff,” citing the attrition the district is currently facing and the opportunity for employees to fill roles on other campuses.
He added however, that he “cannot stand here and say with 100% assurance that no staff is going to be impacted.”
The board could also decide not to accept recommendations come November in the event the public pushes back, he added.
Aquino also denied rumors that the number of schools slated for closure ranges from 20 to 50.
“We are going into this honoring the framework that we are going to develop … by the feedback from the community,” he said.
Beyond the ‘worst case scenario’
A combination of declining birthrates and competition from open enrollment and charter schools in San Antonio have whittled away the enrollment of the urban district at such a fast rate that the district is now more than 4,000 students below what a demographer said was “the worst case scenario” in 2010, according to Martinez, who proposed the resolution.
“Since 1998, student enrollment is down more than 15,000 students,” she said. “We had an independent demographer who presented to our board in November and in January and tied this reduction to a historic decrease in birth rate, and therefore, to school-aged populations across the United States, as well as the shortages of affordable housing options for young families in the urban core.”
The overall decline in enrollment is expected to continue for another decade, Martinez said.
Despite the massive decline in enrollment, however, the district has maintained nearly the same number of buildings. Since schools in Texas receive funding based on the number of students in the building, low enrollment schools are left with fewer resources for electives, extracurricular activities and even core academics.
The sparsely populated schools also leave some teachers without any grade level peers, according to board documents.
For example, 23 teachers in grades PK-5 had no grade level partner at 8 elementary campuses and 13 teachers grades 6-8 had no subject level partner at 5 academies.
A website detailing the district’s “rightsizing” plans launched after the vote Tuesday, showed the extent that schools have emptied out.
Forbes Elementary School, for example, has a capacity of 380 students, but has only 158 students enrolled — 42% capacity. Many hover around 50%, while other parts of the district have campuses exceeding capacity. The variation leads to unequal application of the district’s academics, something trustees aim to remedy in alignment with the “Always Learning” strategic plan.
Of all the schools that are currently operating, only 68% of the capacity is being used by students. But the district owns schools that have been closed over the years, putting the district’s overall utilization of schools at just 54%.
Plans started when Aquino was hired
The resolution Tuesday was written by Martinez, but came about after a lengthy process that began right after Aquino joined SAISD, according to interviews with district officials.
“We began this conversation as soon as I was appointed, and I’ve been public,” Aquino told the San Antonio Report during a visit to Jefferson County, Colorado, to study school closures there in April.
Aquino has also visited nearly every school in the district over the last year, explaining the situation the district is in to teachers, and stressing the possibility of difficult moves in the future.
In recent months, the district has taken staff, board members, parents and members of the San Antonio Alliance teacher and staff union to Cleveland, Ohio, and Jefferson County, Colorado, to study the recent closures of schools in districts there.
“We learned about what to be focused on at the receiving schools, and how do we support them as well, and those communities,” Aquino said of his experience in Colorado. “How to enter the conversations with teachers and principals.”
Alicia Sebastian, board vice president and trustee said she saw how important early and regular communication was throughout the process during her trip to Cleveland.
“The intentionality that the staff and the superintendent had in ensuring that the community was as involved as possible,” she said. “It’s always a difficult, challenging decision either way. But you know, how can we do this collaboratively in the best interests of our families, as well as our students?”
A personal connection
But not everyone on the board is comfortable with handing the reins over to the district without more guidelines in place.
New trustee Stephanie Torres, who recounted on the campaign trail in May her experience as a parent when an SAISD school closed in 2018, was unsure how she was going to vote on the measure Tuesday morning.
She ultimately voted against the measure.
Trustee Sarah Sorensen also said the scope of the resolution was overly broad and timing rushed.
“I appreciate that we are doing this publicly,” she said. “But the timeline is way too tight, the scope is way too broad, and there is not enough time for community engagement.”
Torres said from the dais that even when community engagement was offered at the time, when Rodriguez Middle School closed as a result of chronically failing scores, few teachers and community members participated. A similar situation occurred Tuesday night in the nearly empty boardroom, with no one addressing the resolution during public comment.
Earlier in the day, Torres said she wanted more details than what was provided in the resolution and more time for parents to give feedback on an impactful decision, adding that the district didn’t do enough in previous incidents of closures.
“I’ve been on the other end when people say they listen and hear, but they’re not actually hearing,” she said, adding that students are still adjusting to school after years of disruption due to COVID.
“These kids need the consistency,” she said. “It’d be different if there were a few years after the pandemic, and everything was pretty stable, and they’re coming back. But [for] a lot of these parents, this is their familiarity, this is their stability.”
Anxiety and mistrust still exists in her community, Torres said, adding that she is “still dealing with that impact as a parent of a now-eighth-grader.”
Other parents are also skeptical of the process.
Jacob Ramos, who until recently had two sons in the district, pulled one out over what he said was a lack of communication over a partnership the district had with an 1882 charter partner at his son’s school.
The district’s handling of that situation makes him worry about what comes next, he said.
While the resolution also includes a community engagement plan, Ramos is skeptical of the district’s follow-through.
“Actions speak louder than words,” he said. “If we have multiple meetings, let’s talk about it and show us what they’re seeing.”
Ramos emphasized the importance of transparency and involvement from the district in the decision-making process.
“These are our kids, these are our students, this is our community … we need transparency,” he said.
In a video message posted days before the meeting, Aquino committed to doing just that.
“We are loyal to you, and we will demonstrate our commitment by including you in any major decisions we undertake,” he said. “Your voices and the voices of our students and their families need and will be heard. If the study moves forward.”
COPS/Metro Alliance, a non-profit organization that has been outspoken against the processes used by other districts in San Antonio when closing schools, had a meeting recently with Aquino before the resolution was passed.
In a statement Sonia Rodriguez, a leader for the organization, commended the timeline laid out in the resolution.
“We understand the profound difficulties the district is facing due to decreasing enrollment,” she said. “Other districts facing similar issues could learn from Aquino’s process: slow it down, engage in conversation with families, and build support for the many opportunities to include the community in the decision-making.”
