Ross Haber, the district’s contracted demographer, told the Sachem Board of Education on Aug. 27 that the district is in the data-collection and analysis phase of a comprehensive enrollment and facilities study that will produce 5- and 10-year projections and feed options for attendance-zone changes or school closures.
Haber said projections combine cohort survival (six-year historical grade-by-grade movement), live-birth-based kindergarten projections and adjustments for new housing. “This is a comprehensive study. It's taking a look at enrollment projections, demographics of the community, capacities of the schools and the existing attendance zones,” Haber said. He emphasized that the project had not yet produced conclusions and that the team has not proposed school closings at this stage.
Why it matters: Haber presented baseline projections showing a multi-year decline in district enrollment (he described an approximate decline of about 690 students in recent years and projected further declines absent new housing). He said the team obtained high-quality student-address data (a reported 99% geocode match rate) and will model the effect of planned or under-construction housing on future student counts.
Board concerns and community input: Board members and community speakers raised two recurring concerns: uneven class sizes across elementary schools and how any redistricting would affect pre-K, special education spaces and middle-school configurations. Suzanne Eicher, a PTA leader who spoke during visitors, urged that the district publish current target class-size numbers and make them transparent during the redistricting process. “We should really be looking at that target class size,” Eicher said, noting parents’ frustration where classrooms are already at or above target.
Timetable and deliverables: Haber said building-level utilization tables and school-by-school projections would be completed by Sept. 15, with an interim data report to the board in October and a final recommendation — including any recommendation on closures or boundary changes — by Nov. 30 and final report by Dec. 15. He said the study will show what the district would look like if no changes are made and then offer options for balancing enrollment, equity of program space and class-size targets.
Operational detail and safeguards: Haber said his team uses anonymized student ID numbers and addresses (no names) for geocoding, then maps students to attendance zones and building capacities. He said principals will be surveyed to confirm room usage and special-program placements; those conversations help avoid unintended program losses (for example, ensuring art and music spaces are preserved).
Next steps: The demographer will return with interim data in September; trustees asked staff to publish class-size targets and to ensure community transparency. The board also discussed whether any recommendation should include consideration of bringing sixth grade back to elementary schools or changes to middle-school assignments; Haber said the study includes K–12 data and that middle-school effects will be analyzed after elementary changes are modeled.
No decision to close specific schools was made at the Aug. 27 meeting; Haber repeatedly stated he had drawn no conclusions and that the board would use the data to guide subsequent choices.