Parents, students and community members have piled into meeting rooms and auditoriums to voice comments, questions and concerns as Salt Lake City School District continues to study seven elementary schools for potential closure.
The schools slated for potential closure include: Bennion, Emerson, Hawthorne, Mary W. Jackson, Newman, Riley and Wasatch.
District officials have planned five public information sessions in neighborhoods where the families of students who currently attend those schools live. So far, two such sessions have been held at Bryant and Glendale middle schools.
Three more sessions are scheduled this month in Rose Park, Poplar Grove and Sugar House.
Where can you go to voice questions and concerns?
Out of the three remaining meetings, one will be fully conducted in Spanish, with English translation available:
Wednesday, Oct. 18, Northwest Middle School, 7-9 p.m.
Saturday, Oct. 21, Franklin Elementary, 9-11 a.m. (Meeting in Spanish)
Wednesday, Oct. 25, Hillside Middle School, 7-9 p.m.
District officials from various departments have been made available at the meetings to answer questions from the community, an option that was not present at the first meeting.
No sign-ups have been required for the meetings so far. However, to ask questions or submit comments, attendees will need to fill out cards that district officials will read from — a change made between the first two sessions. Attendees previously asked questions themselves at the Bryant Middle School meeting, but not during the Glendale session.
Those who cannot attend the meetings in-person can watch them live on Salt Lake City School District’s YouTube channel, where the livestreams will be saved for later viewing. The district also has an online form where people can send in comments.
In November, the district will also hold two public comment periods specifically about school closure studies during both of its board meetings at the district’s temporary administrative office, located at 465 S. 400 East:
Tuesday, Nov. 7 at 5:30 p.m.
Monday, Nov. 20 at 5:30 p.m.
Board members will then hold a public hearing at a Dec. 5 meeting, with the decision on whether schools will be closed expected sometime in December or January, according to the district’s timeline.
Why is the district looking to potentially close schools?
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Wasatch Elementary School in Salt Lake City on Tuesday, July 25, 2023.
The closure study comes as the district has lost almost 4,000 K-6 students in the last eight years, Brian Conley, the district’s boundaries and planning director, noted at board meetings and previous public information sessions, leading to an imbalance of student enrollment at many schools.
Conley has also noted in presentations that Salt Lake City has and will continue to have an aging population, which has been noted in reports by demographers the district hired to study its population.
District officials have continued to emphasize that the potential closure of schools will allow them to “right-size” schools — where a building has about three teachers per grade level, with about 25 students per classroom. This would provide opportunities such as field trips that require a certain class size, giving parents more teacher choices per grade, or even more Title I funding for certain schools that currently don’t have enough students, various officials noted.
In December, the state’s Office of the Legislative Auditor General criticized the district for spending money to keep open schools that were losing students and costing taxpayers millions of dollars doing so. The last time the district closed physical schools was in 2002 when Lowell and Rosslyn Heights elementary were shuttered.
District spokesperson Yándary Chatwin said in a September information session that the district had already been exploring the possibility of a population and boundary study of its schools before the audit was released.
“We were aware of that need and the legislative audit just kind of echoed the need that was already there,” Chatwin said.
What are parents concerned about?
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) An empty hallway inside Salt Lake City's Wasatch Elementary School, shown in April 2020.
Many parents have used the information sessions and board meetings so far as an opportunity to speak in support of their children’s schools. They have touted their benefits and achievements, such as Wasatch’s recent National Blue Ribbon School designation and Emerson’s special programs.
Some have expressed that they believe the district has already made a decision on how many schools will close. District officials such as Conley have continued to emphasize at meetings that there has not been a decision made regarding how many schools will close, if any at all.
The district’s remaining 20 elementary schools also are being studied for potential boundary changes in the event that the district decides to officially close any of the seven schools on the list.
Chatwin has said that officials are working on a “comprehensive plan,” including information about where special programs may be relocated. But in-depth information on things such as the transition plan will come after the board has decided if it’s going to close schools.
Others have brought up the fact that if Bennion, Emerson, Wasatch and Hawthorne close, the Central City, Liberty Park and Sugar House areas will be gutted of nearby elementary schools. If so, the nearest alternatives would include Ensign and Uinta elementaries — schools that are significantly higher in elevation and farther away.
“By closing Wasatch, the district would be making it harder for these kids to access their education,” said parent Julia Lyon, who invited board members, district officials and the superintendent to join them on a walk from Wasatch to Ensign. “It would be a tremendous burden on working families that don’t have a car, or maybe only have one car.”
As for schools like Riley, one community member commented recently that the school is adjacent to the Sorenson Multi-Cultural Center, which has been a safe space for students to go after school if their parents may be working late.
“Residents of the west side and Riley’s catchment in particular face struggles that residents of more affluent areas can scarcely imagine,” Chatwin read off a comment card this month. “Among these is the reality that the school day ends much earlier than the work day, leaving parents needing opportunities for their children to safely recreate in the intervening hours.”
Correction • Oct. 18, 2:15 p.m.: This story has been updated to reflect the correct date of the Nov. 20 board meeting. It also corrects the location of the two November board meetings, after officials announced late Tuesday that the meetings would be held at the district’s temporary administrative office.
