By Becky Salato, Superintendent, Konocti Unified School District
Although most public school districts in California are facing declining student enrollment, Konocti Unified continues to grow, which is great, but it does pose a few challenges. With growth comes growing pains. Because we haven’t built a new school in so many years, most of our elementary schools are approaching full capacity. And with so many students, we’re seeing more wear and tear on our facilities. So, we’ll be adjusting the boundary lines of our elementary schools to even things out.
We hired consultants to determine our best course of action. The consultants completed an extensive demographic enrollment projection, incorporating local birth rates (which spiked during COVID-19), new housing developments, California’s new transitional kindergarten (TK) requirements, and current school transfer patterns. Then they met with local government officials to see how our school district and the city might work together to plan for the future.
According to the data, it seems clear that for the next several years, we’ll see steady, rapid growth in our schools. Enrollment is projected to peak in 2027-28 and begin to decrease again, while remaining above current levels through at least 2031.
With careful planning, we can slowly adjust to meet these needs. The first step is to utilize our current space better by distributing our student population more evenly among our schools. Two new housing developments will bring more families into certain parts of our district, and in 2025 all four-year-olds will be eligible for TK, effectively adding another grade level to elementary schools. Each new grade level has approximately 200-250 kids.
Based on all the available information, we believe our new boundary lines will redistribute student numbers to better align with the target capacity at each school. The new boundaries primarily affect three areas of Clearlake, shifting territory out of the Pomo Elementary boundary and into the Lower Lake Elementary boundary. The Burns Valley Elementary boundary will absorb an area that was formerly assigned to Pomo, while it also loses an area that will become assigned to Lower Lake. This results in a net loss of current residents for Burns Valley that will be balanced by new students coming from Konocti Gardens, a new housing development expected to generate the highest number of new students. An additional area will transfer directly from Pomo to Lower Lake.
This means that starting next year, all students enrolling at Konocti Unified will be assigned to a school based on new school boundaries. Parents can always apply for interdistrict transfers, and we’ll do our best to work with families as space allows. If you are affected by the boundary change and you want your child to stay in their current school (or you want their sibling to go to the same school), you can complete an interdistrict transfer request.
For those interested in learning more about the demographic enrollment projection, join us for a meeting at the district office on May 20 from 4:00 - 5:00 pm. If you cannot attend but have questions or concerns, reach out to me at the district office.
Remember, our goal is to meet the needs of our students with the least disruption for most families. All kids deserve to go to schools that are not overcrowded, so while I recognize these boundary adjustments will be disruptive for some, we really have no other choice.
Boundary Adjustment Targets
