It’s Time to Prepare for a Possible Sac Closure Announcement
Let’s get the disclaimer out immediately: I don’t know with certainty that any such announcement is coming. No SPS school closures have been announced, and I don’t have any insider information indicating that they’re being planned.
That said, there are a lot of public indications that closure announcements are coming to SPS this fall. If the district is eyeing closures, there is every reason to think that Sac would be among them.
I’ve been thinking about Sac’s future a lot recently. The Sacajawea community is so different from what it was two years ago during the 2024 closure debacle. That experience built a deep network of relationships, a well of solidarity, and a vast library of community knowledge about SPS systems and how they operate. Two years on, we as a group know so much more about what a closure threat feels like, what we value and will advocate for, and how to fight for it.
In the coming weeks, I will be sharing a series of short pieces to help prepare the Sac community in case a closure announcement comes for us in the fall. I don’t want us to be as surprised as we were last time.
If closure is in our future again, now is the time to build proactive capabilities so that we can participate in the process from a position of strength.
If a closure is announced, what do we want to advocate for: To stay open? To be rebuilt? To go elsewhere as a community, or for each of us to choose our own family’s next school? If the building is shuttered, what kind of hand do we want to have in shaping what happens to the property? What might it look like to advocate for any of these things, and what power and tools do we have at our disposal?
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I’ll be thrilled if I’m wrong about a closure announcement being imminent.
But even if I am wrong, the Sac community is already under pressure from the district, whether we have acknowledged it or not. Our student population is dwindling due to uncertainty about our future. With the district unwilling to properly staff our small population, our classroom configurations are becoming dire.
We will have homerooms with more than 30 kids next year (for context, the official maximum class sizes are 17 for K-2 and 28 for 3-5). Our kids won’t get music instruction. The building has been neglected for so long that even basic maintenance is no longer a priority.
Sac is already in a struggle.
This series is my way of laying some groundwork for community organizing to pull us through. It’s my hope that what I’m sharing here will be valuable regardless of the specific form that the struggle takes.
Over the coming month, here’s what’s headed your way on Thursdays:
Why a Sac closure proposal seems likely this fall (Coming July 9)
What has changed since the 2024 fight to save Sac (Coming July 16)
Things to consider if Sac must close (Coming July 23)
Mapping our community power and leverage (Coming July 30)
I hope you read along. I’ll be thrilled when the ideas I share here start to build into new ideas through community conversation. If—no, when!—that happens, please share your ideas with your neighbors, and with me at advocacy@sacpta.org.
I will also be organizing some community meetings in August, so stay tuned for those invites as this series progresses.