Community Meeting at Landers Elementary to explore possible school closures and boundary consolidations
Landers Elementary School will be the setting for a community meeting this evening at 5:30 p.m. discussing the possible closure of the school and consolidation of the students into neighboring Yucca Mesa Elementary.
Landers Elementary is one of 11 elementary schools in the Morongo Unified School District (MUSD). Enrollment numbers have been down this year once again, and projections for future enrollment numbers aren’t optimistic that the trend can turn around.
The MUSD spent the latter half of last school year holding Enrollment Committee meetings, where a group of parents, students, teachers, and faculty explored different scenarios on how to turn around the declining numbers. A student enrolled within the school district is worth about $16,000 according to the MUSD, and Landers Elementary currently has just 106 students enrolled, dropping 14 students from last year’s numbers.
Ideally, each of the 11 elementary schools would have between 400-450 students in them for optimal use of staffing, resources, and bus transportation.
The Enrollment Committee ultimately recommended that the school district find other ways to make up the budget deficit without closing any of the elementary schools. Other schools floated for possible consolidation are neighboring Yucca Mesa Elementary, Palm Vista in Twentynine Palms and Morongo Valley Elementary.
The meeting tonight at Landers Elementary is being put on by the MUSD and they say they want to listen to the experiences, concerns and needs of their students and families to better understand what matters most to the Landers Community.
A strong turnout is expected, as Landers families say that a loss of the school there would also fundamentally change the small unincorporated area – saying that the school acts as a community hub and a social identity for the students and parents. All residents are invited to the meeting which begins at 5:30 p.m. Thursday night and is expected to go until 7:00 p.m.
Landers Elementary is located at 56450 Reche Road in Landers.
Previously reported: