The Patrick Henry and Jefferson-Houston school communities largely want their schools to remain as-is, but Alexandria City Public Schools (ACPS) said analysis showed they might need to convert to an elementary and middle school to help with division-wide capacity problems.
Currently, Patrick Henry and Jefferson-Houston are Pre-K through 8th-grade schools, but ACPS is considering converting one or both schools into elementary schools (Pre-K through 5th grade) or middle schools (6th through 8th grade).
In a School Board-City Council joint meeting this week, ACPS staff keeping both schools intact was the most popular option. Of 353 total respondents to a survey, 106 said they wanted to keep the schools as Pre-K-8 schools.
The other top choices were for the schools to become elementary schools with a new middle school opened at 1703 Beauregard Street and for schools to remain in their current state, but with an additional school identified to become a K-8 school, a new middle school is constructed, and 1703 Beauregard Street has expanded capacity as a K-5 school.
However, staff at the meeting said capacity projections make keeping the schools as-is untenable. Projections show capacity at the schools increasing to 117% by 2027, though that goes down to 111% by 2029.
In contrast, making one of the schools an elementary school and the other a middle school keeps capacity at around 100%.
Staff also noted that the construction of a new middle school is unfeasible, with a projected initial cost of $130 million straining the school CIP funding. Beyond just needing to identify more funding for the new school, ACPS would also need to find land to build the school.
While the option to convert 1703 Beauregard Street to a middle school — formerly office space currently being outfitted as elementary school swing space — was included in the survey, staff found that further study showed the idea is unfeasible.
A deeper analysis shows that would not solve our middle school overutilization issue,” staff said.
Staff also said there would be substantial costs to retrofit the building, currently being turned into an elementary school space, into a middle school — for what ACPS determined would only be a short-term solution.
Mayor Justin Wilson said, in spite of the contrast between staff and the school communities’ visions for the future of the schools, the report was well constructed in clearly showing the tradeoffs and costs with each approach.
“This involves some tradeoffs,” Wilson said, adding as a joke: “As you noted, the community input is going to be against a change. We haven’t seen that before ever on the city side, so that’s surprising.”
Photo via Jefferson-Houston PreK-8 School/Facebook
