Olympia elementary school closures on the table due to budget deficit, officials say
.jpg "Knox Building, the Olympia School District main office.")
Some Olympia elementary schools are being eyed for consolidation as a potential solution to the school district’s $17 million budget deficit, according to officials at a recent school board meeting.
The district has been in discussion for months over how to handle the upcoming budget deficit. Superintendent Patrick Murphy previously called it the result of a perfect storm, one that includes the lack of federal funding, state funding, a local levy cap and declining enrollment. He said it’s an issue that’s happening statewide, and even the elementary school his children attended has since closed to consolidation.
It’s an issue he said needs to be looked at more deeply on a statewide level. Basic education isn’t being funded adequately by the state, and the local tax limit has made it impossible for the community to make up the difference.
Assistant Superintendent Jennifer Priddy said the state allocates funding based on the number of students in a school.
For example, it would take having 319 students at one elementary school for the state to fully fund one principal position. But Olympia pays more than 20% higher than the state allocates, meaning it would take about 370 students to fund an elementary school principal position in Olympia, she said.
The following data was shared during the March 2 meeting:
▪ The state’s allocation is for average-level positions. Olympia has a lot of veteran teachers who are being paid more than the state is providing.
▪ For a full-time teacher librarian position, which allows an elementary school to operate a library full time, a school would have to have 700 students. Not a single elementary school in Olympia has 500.
▪ At the funding level Olympia schools provides, it would take 561 students in one school for the state to provide one guidance counselor. It would take more than 1,100 in one school for the state to fund one nurse position. It would take 5,624 students in one school for one family liaison, and 6,187 students for one state-funded psychologist.
▪ There are about 3,500 elementary students in total in Olympia. That’s down by nearly 550 since the pandemic, but even that earlier number wouldn’t have been enough for the state to fund some positions.
▪ By next year, enrollment at Madison will have gone down 43% to less than 200 kids. Pioneer has gone down 31%, and McKenny has gone down 29%. A few others aren’t far behind.
One of the district’s smallest schools is Boston Harbor, with 166 students projected for 2023-2024. The school has lost 20 students since the 2019-2020 school year. There are enough students for the state to fund 0.4 principals, 0.2 teacher librarians, 0.2 guidance counselors, 0.1 nurses and .03 family liaisons. Every position is being subsidized by the four-year enrichment levy passed in 2020.
Murphy said they’re not only looking at consolidating as a solution. There are likely cuts that can be made elsewhere, too, and they aren’t even sure how much closing an elementary school could save them. He said it could end up not being worth it. He said having this sort of data shows how little the state is providing for the district, but it doesn’t give them a clear understanding of what to do; it only gives them a clear understanding of what the problem is.
Board member Maria Flores said she was appreciative of Priddy’s breakdown of the hard-to-swallow information, but it makes her crazy every time she sees it. She said the data shows there’s no recognition from the state on what it costs to fund basic education.
Flores said she doesn’t support closing schools. Boston Harbor is in her district, and she said it could be traumatizing to young students to see their schools fully shut down. She brought up the idea of redistricting or redrawing attendance boundaries, but she was met with opposition by director Hilary Seidel, who said that isn’t going to bring back the 500 students the district has lost.
Board member Scott Clifthorne said he’s hopeful House Bill 1244 will gain more traction this legislative session. Backed by nearly 20 representatives including Beth Doglio, it would increase the maximum per pupil limit for enrichment levy authority, or tax collection. It includes inflation enhancements of 3.17% per year from 2024 to 2028.
Board president Darcy Huffman said she encourages people to tell their legislators that schools will continue to be affected by the pandemic until the kids who started kindergarten on Zoom have graduated high school.
She said she wasn’t on the board when the decision to spend federal relief funds on new positions was made, but if she were, she would have voted for them, and that it wasn’t a mistake to make the district deal with the fallout now.
Murphy said he’ll be going out to schools to try to paint a clear picture of what the situation is. He said he wants to make it clear to educators that whatever decisions they make, it isn’t a reflection of the work being done at the schools. He and other board members said they want more parent involvement and to hear what priorities people have.
The next OSD board meeting is scheduled for 6:30 p.m. March 9.
This story was originally published March 8, 2023 at 5:00 AM.
.jpg)