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West Salem board approves elementary and middle-school open-enrollment caps for 2026–27
Summary
The West Salem School Board approved grade-level open-enrollment caps for elementary and middle schools after reviewing the districtenrollment counts; the board retained flexibility to add sections or request additional staff if demand rises.
The West Salem School Board on Tuesday approved grade-level open-enrollment caps for the 2026–27 school year after the superintendent reported the districtwide 2nd-Friday-in-January enrollment count and forecasts.
Superintendent Ryan told the board the second-Friday January count sets funding and open-enrollment limits used by the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction and that overall enrollment was up slightly since fall but the district remains down in the longer term. "Our open enrollment in students decreased by 7," Ryan said. "That total account number is the number that gets looked at as far as revenue coming from the DPI." He warned the district is projecting a net decline of roughly 29 students next year on top of recent losses, which could affect staffing and revenue-limit calculations.
Alex, the elementary administrator, presented proposed caps for the elementary grades and explained why the limits were chosen. "I'm proposing that we set a limit, an open enrollment cap of 10 at 4K," Alex said, noting the board could later approve an additional section if demand required hiring another 4K teacher. Alex also proposed no cap for kindergarten (100 students across six sections), a cap of 10 for first and second grades, a cap of 8 for third grade and a cap of 7 for fourth grade to protect class size and program quality.
Board members asked procedural questions about how caps apply to currently enrolled resident students and what would happen if open-enrollment demand exceeded the caps. Ryan described the districtprocess: once a cap is reached the administration would return to the board with a staffing recommendation. "If once we got to that cap of 10, we'd look to see how many were there," Ryan said, adding any change that required hiring an additional 4K teacher would come back to the board for approval.
After discussion, a motion to accept the elementary open-enrollment caps as presented was moved, seconded and approved by voice vote. The board later reviewed and approved the middle-school open-enrollment limits as presented, including a target of 25 for most grades and a specific open-enrollment number for each grade based on projections.
The board noted the caps are intended to balance class-size goals and operational staffing limits; the administration will monitor enrollments and return to the board if additional staffing is needed to expand capacity.
