San Jose charter high school to close amid budget shortages, declining enrollment
As a result of declining enrollments and budget shortages, DCP Alum Rock High School, a small charter school with roughly 200 students, will close its doors this summer, the Mercury News reported.
“I know once the board said ‘yes, we recommend closing it,’ we took a breath … and once we walked out that door, it was just (a blow),” Madison Christian Sumpter, a junior at Downtown College Prep Alum Rock High School, told the Mercury News.
Since the 2019-20 academic year, when the Covid-19 pandemic shook California school systems, DCP Alum Rock High School’s enrollment has decreased by 30%.
To create a balanced budget, school administrators said they would have to eliminate nearly half of its staff.
Meanwhile, DCP’s CEO, Pete Settelmayer, told the Mercury News that the school’s 205 students did not lead to enough state revenue to support all of their services. Their deficit, he said, was between $1.5 million to $1.7 million.
“We had to start asking ourselves, at what point are we doing a disservice to our students?” he told The Mercury News.
“It’s not just about numbers. We know that when you close a school, it’s a community, it’s a family. That’s hard. It’s the last thing anyone wants to do. But the flip side is, am I going to be able to provide them with a place that will serve all of their needs?”
The community has responded negatively to the decision — and juniors Gracie Jaqueline Lopez and Sumpter initiated a petition to help the school remain open.
“The reason I chose to come to (DCP Alum Rock High School) is because we’re a small community and a community that treats each other like family,” Lopez said in a YouTube video encouraging the community to sign the petition, according to the Mercury News.
“You’re not going to find teachers anywhere else that have this much dedication to their students. Especially when I lost someone very special to me, my teacher and the staff members all came together and supported me.”