Small HISD schools lose big
Drops in enrollment sparking talks of consolidating some campuses
For as long as Gloria Hall’s two daughters have attended Alcott Elementary School, a high-performing campus with 230 students on Houston’s southeast side, they have received intensive one-onone attention from teachers that she said speeds up their academic and social progress.
“The big, massive elementary schools that look like universities — the ones you see out in Katy — you don’t get that personal touch because there are too many children,” said Hall, whose daughters attend first and fifth grade. “To me, the bigger schools have bigger problems.”
In the coming years, however, Houston ISD officials may have to decide whether the district can afford to maintain intimate campuses like Alcott, the district’s smallest neighborhood elementary school.
As Houston faces a third consecutive fiscal year of significant budget cuts, enrollment at several of the district’s smallest — and
most expensive — elementary schools has dropped dramatically in 2018-19, according to district data obtained by the Houston Chronicle. While school officials have not proposed closing any schools or initiated any formal conversations, Interim Superintendent Grenita Lathan said merging some lower-enrollment campuses could help close budget shortfalls and provide more academic opportunities for students.
“We have to talk about possibilities,” Lathan said in early December, following the district’s first school board workshop addressing the 2019-2020 budget. “Long term, would it behoove us to consolidate some campuses?”
Competition, housing costs
Elementary schools accounted for roughly 90 percent of HISD’s 3,500-student enrollment decline this academic year, the district’s largest reduction since 2006. HISD’s four smallest elementary schools — Alcott, Briscoe, Pleasantville and Port Houston — each enrolled fewer than 300 students this year. Several smaller elementary schools experienced doubledigit percentage declines in enrollment, including Briscoe, Fondren and Tijerina. On average, elementary schools in Houston ISD and the Greater Houston area enroll about 650 students.
“That’s very alarming to me that we’re losing kids at the elementary school level,” HISD Trustee Holly Maria Flynn Vilaseca said. “Once we lose them, that could be 12 years of a student not being part of the HISD family. We’re missing out on years and years of enrollment.” In a statement, HISD officials attributed the enrollment declines to increased competition from charter schools and movement of families to school districts with more affordable housing. Lathan also has said that the district’s administrative and governance issues likely have prompted some parents to leave HISD.
“We continually engage in community relations efforts to educate parents about beneficial programs and resources available in HISD,” district officials said in the statement. They cited the district’s topranked magnet schools, dual credit college offerings and its new Parent University engagement effort.
In addition to out-of-district transfers, some lower-enrollment HISD schools also lose hundreds of students to other in-district magnet and specialty campuses. For example, 700 children who are zoned to attend Cullen Middle School travel to other HISD campuses, while only 345 students attend the school.
While campus closures have not been seriously discussed, Lathan’s mere mention of the politically unpopular possibility illustrates the district’s financial predicament. HISD trustees have addressed shortfalls totaling about $210 million over the past two years by pulling about $125 million from reserve funds and cutting spending. District officials are projecting a $76 million deficit in 2019-2020, though that total is based on conservative property tax revenue estimates.
Several HISD schools have dropped well below the district’s enrollment targets, hemorrhaging students over the past few years. Those schools require additional funding, largely through the district-provided “small school subsidy,” to ensure basic services are provided.
The supplemental funding, however, puts some additional strain on HISD’s finances. District budget documents show roughly 80 of the district’s 284 campuses — mostly elementary and specialty schools — will receive subsidies this year totaling nearly $20 million. HISD’s four elementary schools with sub-300 enrollment are expected to receive about $1.4 million combined.
Unpopular option
By closing schools, HISD experiences several financial benefits — less spending on small-school subsidies, fewer facilities costs, possible profit from property sales — and moves children to higher-enrollment campuses with more academic and after-school offerings.
However, closures also force families to travel farther to school and remove key pillars from communities. Prior proposals to shutter campuses have been met with strong backlash, including allegations of racial discrimination. Of the 11 recent school closures, 10 have occurred in predominantly non-white neighborhoods. About 8 percent of the district’s enrollment is white.
“I think, at some point, we’re going to have to start seeing how we can ensure we don’t rob a neighborhood, because that’s the scary part,” Lathan said. “But if two schools are within two blocks of each other and one is underutilized, maybe it’s ‘two schools exist on the same campus,’ so the school doesn’t lose their name. There are creative ways to do it.”
Most Houston ISD elementary schools are located a half-mile to 2 miles apart from other campuses. Some of the district’s lowest-enrollment elementary campuses neighbor schools that are not near capacity, including all four of the sub-300-student campuses. Pleasantville and Port Houston, for example, are separated by 1.2 miles, and Pleasantville’s facility can support an additional 475 students beyond its current enrollment.
For Karmesha Duplechain, who has children in pre-kindergarten and kindergarten at Alcott, increasing enrollment and offering more extracurricular opportunities should be the priority at her neighborhood campus. Duplechain said she takes her two older children to first and fifth grades at Law Elementary School, about five miles southwest of Alcott, after administrators told her Alcott could not afford to add classes to accommodate her kids.
“By me having to bring two of them here and then having to go over (to Law), both of them will be late because school starts at the same time,” Duplechain said. “It’s a big hassle.”