The reality of declining enrollments across the region is prompting lots of tough conversations between town and school officials about how to calculate budgets and determine space needs over the next decade. Some towns are actually toying with closing schools, redistricting to level out class size, and recalculating staffing needs.
Brookfield’s Board of Education recently was given a demographic presentation by the planning firm of Milone & MacBroom that provided a full population growth analysis that was quite clear that enrollments will be on the decline for at least the next five years, and likely a decade. School and town leaders are concerned about the trends, but have differing perspectives on the actual meaning behind the figures.
The News-Times will have a story online and in print about the recent study and reaction.