Parents urge board to address falling enrollment at Jefferson elementary; request task force and program options

At the Richland School District board meeting, parents urged the board to take a proactive approach to declining enrollment at Jefferson Elementary, asking for transparent analysis and a district-supported task force to explore causes and solutions.

"We want our children to be part of a stable, thriving school community," said Angela Gregoric, a Jefferson parent, during the public-comment period. Gregoric said volunteer parents have assembled preliminary enrollment trend research and are asking the board to investigate why families in North Richland are choosing alternatives such as homeschooling, private schools or transfers within the district. She urged a task force to examine enrollment trends, boundary and transfer policies, and program options and to engage families in developing solutions.

Danielle Green, another Jefferson parent, said the problem is not a lack of neighborhood children but that families are opting for other options. She warned that ongoing reactive staffing reductions threaten programs and instruction, and recommended the district consider limiting but not banning in-district transfers, and piloting specialty programs—dual language, school gardens or other offerings—that might encourage families to stay. "We need programs," Green said. "It could be dual language. This could be gardens—something that entices these families to choose our public schools."

Board members responded that the district is already collecting related data and that a facilities task force is examining district capacity. Members asked staff for more detailed data: a building-level snapshot using the October enrollment submission, a multi-year view of in-district transfers (net flows), and a list of empty classrooms and current choice programs (Home Link, River's Edge) to assess capacity for new offerings. Ruby, a district staffer, circulated preliminary in-district transfer counts showing Jefferson had 13 transfers in and 12 out this year (net +1), but board members asked for a multi-year cumulative view to detect trends.

The board discussed exploring targeted programs to attract families and asked administrators and the facilities task force to evaluate program feasibility and unused space. Several directors said any task force or program-review should include substantial parent engagement.

What’s next: Board asked staff to provide a multi-year transfer analysis, building-level class-size and capacity snapshots (October data recommended), and an inventory of underused classrooms to inform whether to pilot new choice programs for Jefferson.