The Duval Schools administration building. | Megan Mallicoat, Jacksonville Today
Published on November 1, 2024 at 11:40 am
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On Monday, the Duval School Board will decide whether to close six elementary schools and a middle school magnet program, part of an effort to find $100 million in cost cuts in the district’s budget.
One statistic district officials have returned to over and over amid the debate on school closures is that it takes an enrollment of at least 700 children for a school to break even with its operating expenses. And that’s our number of the week.
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700
According to a district spokesperson, Duval Schools receives about $8,750 from the state per student enrolled.
To estimate the operational costs of a school, the district looks at three broad categories: staff, custodial services and utilities. The exact cost varies according to an individual school’s needs — it might have programs that are more or less expensive to operate, or its building might need specific maintenance.
Now let’s dig into the finances of the affected schools — and some of the schools that got crossed off the closure list recently after community outcry in their neighborhoods. The schools that are slated to close (with asterisks) aren’t necessarily the most expensive to operate.
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For utilities and custodial services, the most recent figures available are those of fiscal year 2022-23, when Duval Schools spent $21.8 million on utilities and more than $30 million on custodial services, across all schools.
Most schools in the district — and all of the schools on the current list of recommended closures — cost the district more money to operate than they generate in state funding.
