The Juneau School District is projected to lose close to a sixth of its students over the next five years. That’s a drop in enrollment of about 600 students.
District administration presented this information to the Juneau School Board’s facilities committee Tuesday afternoon.
“Some of this isn’t information I want to hear. But, it’s very very important information for us to hear,” Board member and Facilities Committee Chair Steve Whitney said during the meeting. “And I think (it’s) something we’re going to have to, (it’s) definitely is going to be a focus of a lot of what we do in the coming future.”
Superintendent Shawn Arnold attributed the decline to lower birth rates and increased outmigration. To address falling enrollment, the school board asked the district to consider a pilot program that would restructure grades at a couple elementary schools.
One option could take two elementary schools, and have one teach only preschool to third grades. The other school would teach fourth to sixth grade students.
The committee did not have time to discuss the pilot program in depth on Tuesday.
After the meeting, Superintendent Shawn Arnold told KTOO the district is looking into piloting a program with Sit’ Eeti’ Shaanax – Glacier Valley Elementary and Mendenhall River Community School. He said the restructured model has benefits, like moving away from multi-grade classrooms.
“We would be able to offer, you know, straight grade levels,” he said. “It would allow an opportunity for teachers to collaborate more because currently many of our elementary schools are operating without peer teachers.”
Arnold said the pilot program could put multiple classes of a single grade level in one school, which gives teachers more opportunity to work together.
Recently, lower student enrollment caused the district to eliminate four teaching positions at elementary schools. That led to changes in classroom assignments and even a teacher moving schools in the midst of the school year.
In addition to considering a pilot program, Arnold said the district is working on a facilities study to see how much each elementary school is currently being utilized.
Arnold said the district is in the early stages of discussions, and administrators can only provide recommendations. Final decisions on a pilot program would be made by the school board.
“We’re only exploring this at this time, and coming up with the roadmap, It also includes transportation options,” he said. “How would this be least impactful to best support this, this challenge of declining enrollment?”
The school board is scheduled to meet on Oct. 27. The next facilities committee meeting is scheduled for Nov. 3 on Zoom.
