More and more schools, due to significant enrollment declines, are closing their doors across the country, says a new report, particularly in the nation’s urban areas.
“Gone is the loud clatter of students bursting through crowded hallways and slamming lockers,” says the report, filed by reporter Vince Bielski on the site RealClearInvestigations.
The closed schools create an eerie presence, with some cities seeing boarded up high, middle, and elementary school structures, left to themselves on vacant campuses.
According to the National Center for Education Statistics, an average of 1,350 schools closed annually between 2011 and 2020. The trend line has slightly tapered off in recent years but is still significant with an average of just over 800 schools closed in 2021 and 2022.
Megacities such as New York and Los Angeles have both endured double-digit enrollment declines in recent years, with New York closing around 90 schools, but so have merely large cities such as Denver, which has seen its student count drop from 94,000 in 2019 and around 89,000 as of last year.
Which schools should be closed in Denver, and where, have led to battles between Denver Public Schools officials and residents and community leaders, especially in the wake of a plan to close ten schools with enrollments of less than 215 students. That plan has yet to be finalized.
According to the real estate listing site Loopnet, there are nearly 500 former school buildings currently for sale in various parts of the country. Many of the one-time educational facilities are advertised for their repurposing potential, which most often envisions turning them into community centers or apartment and condominium complexes.
The former Miles Bryan School in McKees Rock, Pennsylvania was built in 1927 and closed in 1997. A historic 90,000 square-foot structure, the school is now being advertised by the local Found It Real Estates Services for its “fantastic potential for community center, mixed use, and housing.”
Meanwhile, the school closing trend continues: In November, the San Antonio Independent School Board voted to close 15 schools due to declining enrollments; the Grand Rapids Public School in Michigan has just announced that it will be closing 10 schools in the next several years; while the Pittsburg Public School Boards is actively considering closing half a dozen schools.
By Garry Boulard