Douglas County prepares to close schools — and build new ones — as district sees shift in where students live

The Douglas County School District is facing an enrollment paradox: It must close schools with too few students even as it needs to build new ones in growing suburban neighborhoods miles away.

District officials say they will close as many as three elementary schools in Highlands Ranch at the end of the 2025-26 academic year, a move that comes as public school enrollment is falling statewide.

But at the same time, the construction of new housing developments in Douglas County is shifting where children live, creating what district Superintendent Erin Kane has previously called “school deserts.”

So the Douglas County School District will also construct new schools for the children living in areas now without them, including two elementary schools in the expanding Sterling Ranch and RidgeGate communities, thanks to the $490 million bond voters passed in November.

“We’re really trying to make sure that we temper our reaction to declining enrollment while making sure that we keep our district viable and keep opportunities for kids at the forefront,” Kane said during a presentation this week on the district’s closure plans.

The district is looking at 16 elementary schools in Highlands Ranch that could end up being part of its consolidation plan. Of those schools, the Douglas County School District would ultimately close two to three, according to the presentation.

More than 10,400 children attended elementary schools in Highlands Ranch a decade ago. Now, there are 7,409 students in those same schools and the number is expected to dwindle to 6,476 by 2028, according to the district.

“We can’t have the same number of buildings that housed 11,000 kids house 6,000 kids and still be able to offer fantastic opportunities for students,” Kane said. “The overhead involved in that is catastrophic, or will be catastrophic if we wait a really long time and wait until we are falling off a fiscal cliff, which is why we’re trying to address this challenge now.”

The 16 Highlands Ranch schools that district officials are looking at feed into three secondary schools: Highlands Ranch High School, Mountain Vista High School and ThunderRidge High School, said Steve Colella, the district’s chief of staff.

“We are certainly seeing some declining enrollment in other parts of our district, but the issue is most acute in those three feeders and in Highlands Ranch,” he said, adding that the Douglas County School District will still have small schools after the looming consolidations.

So far, the district has made no decisions regarding which specific elementaries will close and merge with other schools.

In January, district officials plan to present what criteria they want to use in consolidating schools to the Board of Education.

District leaders will then present their final closure plan to the school board on April 8. Board members will vote on whether to approve the recommendation on April 22, according to the presentation.

Employees affected by the closures will not lose jobs because they will be able to find employment elsewhere in the district, including at the new schools their students attend, Kane said.

The Douglas County School District is holding two more public meetings with families about the potential closures this month.

One will be held at 6 p.m. Wednesday at Cresthill Middle School, 9195 Cresthill Lane, in Highlands Ranch. The other meeting will take place virtually at 6 p.m. Dec. 18. People interested in attending can RSVP at dcsdk12.org/about/growth-and-decline.

The Douglas County School District enrolled 61,964 students during the 2023-24 academic year, which is down more than 8% — or 5,627 pupils — from five years earlier, according to the latest enrollment data from the Colorado Department of Education.

As enrollment declines, so does a school’s per-pupil funding. When a school receives less funding, it can affect academic offerings, such as music classes, and extracurricular activities.

The Douglas County district, the third largest in Colorado, is the latest in metro Denver to consider shutting down schools as enrollment in the state’s public schools has plunged to the lowest point in a decade amid declining births.

Denver Public Schools, the state’s largest district, will close seven schools and restructure another three schools so they serve fewer students at the end of the current academic year. Jeffco Public Schools has shuttered more than a dozen schools in recent years.

School districts are finding themselves in a unique position as enrollment falls.

The decline in births means their are fewer children to teach, but housing costs and new development are also changing where families live across metro Denver. This means that as districts close schools, they’re also building new ones in places where housing is booming.

In the Douglas County School District, which spans more than 850 square miles, enrollment is falling in places like Highlands Ranch but growing in the Sterling Ranch and RidgeGate communities where there aren’t schools nearby.

That’s left the district to bus students from neighborhoods without schools to those that do have them, Kane said.

“This is causing tremendous challenges,” she said.

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