BELLEVUE, Wash. — Bellevue School District elementary-level students and parents continued their rally cries outside of open houses on two campuses Wednesday, pleading that their school be spared from consolidation.
It comes after a week of backlash from families, since the district proposed a shift to consolidate three of seven under-enrolled elementary schools to stabilize their budget.
The seven elementary schools under consideration include Ardmore, Eastgate, Enatai, Phantom Lake, Sherwood Forest, Woodridge, and Wilburton. The district said these seven schools have experienced the greatest enrollment decline, and are projected to keep shrinking.
Now, teachers are hoping they can keep their jobs.
This comes as a new superintendent is getting ready to step straight into the fire. That person-- yet to be publicly revealed-- will be announced by the Bellevue School District Board of Directors Thursday.
"This was the first year where kids could be kids and actually start building relationships, and now you're talking about ripping those apart," said Wilburton parent Lisa Ross.
But the Deputy Superintendent for Financial Services and operations, Melissa deVita, said this is not necessarily the case.
"We're going to be working with those communities to co-develop the transition plan in the timeline."
These are some possibilities of how school communities would consolidate:
- Ardmore students would move to Sherwood Forest or Sherwood Forest and Bennett
- Eastgate students would move to Spiritridge or Spiritridge and Somerset
- Enatai students would move to Woodridge and Wilburton
- Phantom Lake students would move to Lake Hills and Spiritridge
DeVita said staff at the three chosen schools will not be laid off under this plan; rather that they will be moved to one of the same schools that their students go.
But how will they fit?
"Every year we have switchover, we have turnover, we, you know, we're not fully staffed now. We have openings, and nutrition services, and bus drivers. And so we've got opportunities for people, if they want to stay with the district. The goal is, though, to have teachers move with the kids, because the kids have bonded with those teachers. They know what they look like they've seen them. And so that will be super helpful, right?" said deVita.
But this parent isn't buying it.
"Tthey're going to lose their teachers," said Ross. "They're going to lose a librarian, you can't have two librarians in one school. So which librarian gets to go, what music teacher gets to go?"
The decision will be made Feb. 9th, according to the district.
What does the teachers union think of all this? KING5 spoke with the president of the Bellevue Education Association.
“As the conversation around consolidation continues within our district, BEA members, district employees, students, families, and community members feel the time dedicated to this difficult decision has not been considered, as the timeline of the decision is soon approaching," said President Jill Rock. "It is important for there to be transparency for broader understanding of why this decision is being made at this time and gain clarity of the full picture. As an association, we understand that BSD has the arduous task of maintaining fiscally responsible decision-making to ensure that we are continuing to best serve our diverse learning community for the years ahead."
Parents said they first learned their school may be shutting down on Jan. 6. There was a BSD Board of Education meeting on Jan. 12.
DeVita said the time is now to make the consolidation changes, as significant funding is soon going away.
"What's more important: where the school is located? Or the services and quality of education that kids get when they get to school?" said deVita. "We can cut some of our teaching leaders, we can cut our assistant principals, we can reduce some of the parent educators, our specialist teachers-- instead of traveling to two schools, could be traveling to four... So now they're spending more time in their cars and less time supporting kids. So these are all cuts that would have to be made."
$20 million in Hold-Harmless revenue the district received from the state during the pandemic will go away next school year, the 2023-2024 school year, according to deVita.
She added that the ESSER funds from the federal government will go away in the 2024-2025 school year.
As for why enrollment is declining, the district said it has to do with decreasing birth rates, increasing housing costs, impacts from the pandemic and recent tech layoffs in the area. The factors were supported by a recent study conducted by the Wall Street Journal.