By Ary Amerikaner and Halley Potter
Many states and districts across the country are facing declining student enrollment, and with it, declining per pupil funding from state and federal revenue sources. They are simultaneously experiencing the “fiscal cliff” that occurred when billions of dollars in federal Covid-relief funding ran out in 2024. Districts often turn to school consolidations or closures in these times, but they do not always save as much money as hoped, and the underlying school closures disproportionately hurt students of color (especially Black students) and students living in poverty. This is a difficult time for those whose job it is to balance a school district’s budget.
Framed one way, magnet schools could easily end up on the chopping block in this fiscal climate. Magnet schools’ abilities to promote diversity, offer unique thematic and pedagogical approaches, and build community partnerships may too easily begin to seem like secondary priorities. But framed another way, a magnet school strategy tailored to the challenge of declining enrollment can be a powerful tool for districts facing financial stress.
Instead of closing or consolidating under-enrolled schools in high-poverty neighborhoods, districts can instead increase enrollment by transforming them into innovative, theme-based, and diverse whole-school magnet programs that serve all neighborhood students as well as attracting others from across the district.
Here are three broad steps district leaders can take to pursue this strategy:
The district—as a whole—has a budget to balance, a student body to support. Avoid the temptation to frame the challenge as underenrollment in a few schools, which biases the conversation about solutions toward closing those schools, and is an oversimplified description that leaves out any discussion of the districtwide policies and practices that led to underenrollment in those schools. Instead, in line with the district’s mission, values, and dedication to providing excellence for all, commit to not close or consolidate schools in the most high-poverty, marginalized neighborhoods, and instead support and, where necessary, improve them.
What, structurally, do families want from their schools? What themes or programs would be exciting? Dual language immersion programs? Science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) themed schools? Arts academies? Montessori programming?
PK-2 schools that are designed especially for younger students? Project-based learning? International Baccalaureate (IB) schools? An early college high school? Are there any schools/programs elsewhere in the district that families would like to see expanded, replicated, or relocated to other neighborhoods? Use simple surveys in multiple languages, phone calls at hours that accommodate families on different schedules, and community engagement sessions. Make sure to reach all the communities in your district, including those where engagement has been low in recent years, and weigh their input equitably.
Identify schools located in the district’s most under-resourced communities that have the capacity to serve additional students. Commit to keep them open, and to invest in them to attract additional students from across the district. Explain to your entire community that while the district may need to close/consolidate some other schools due to the district’s financial challenges, any student whose neighborhood school changes due to school closure/consolidation will be offered a spot (on a voluntary basis) in the new, innovative whole school magnet program.
Then plan collaboratively with educators and local stakeholders to create, expand, or relocate themed magnet school opportunities that district families say they want. Open new themed programs in historically underserved communities in the same year as the closure of other schools in the district, so that any student facing a change in their zoned school due to consolidation also has exciting new opportunities. And design a controlled choice lottery system to allow students from across the district to access the magnet schools.
To be clear, implementing whole-school magnet programs in under-enrolled schools is not a silver bullet or holistic strategy to address the multitude of challenges accompanying declining enrollment. For instance, districts cannot shift demographic declines or economic trends causing families to flee geographically; but they can work toward making district schools more appealing compared to private, parochial, or homeschooling options. Furthermore, magnet schools will be more helpful in some contexts than others. (For example, districts that already have a charter-heavy or lottery-based approach to operating public schools may not find this idea new or relevant.) But it is a concrete idea that could provide leaders in many traditional districts a real alternative to some of the most commonly used and problematic approaches to declining enrollment. And it is also a way for magnet schools to find new relevance in challenging financial climates.
Brown’s Promise and The Century Foundation recently published a resource for district leaders that explains this strategy in more detail. If you have questions or are interested in learning more, send us a note at info@brownspromise.org and bridgescollaborative@tcf.org.
