Most closed schools don't stay that way for long
Published: Thursday, Feb. 21, 2013 - 10:36 am
Last Modified: Thursday, Feb. 21, 2013 - 10:46 am
If the Sacramento City Unified school board votes to close 10 schools tonight, chances are many will reopen soon as specialty or charter schools.
School districts across Sacramento County have closed about 60 schools in the last 10 years. Fewer than half remain shuttered, according to a Bee review of data from the state Department of Education.
About one-quarter reopened as charter schools. Roughly 20 percent reopened as specialty schools - special education; adult education; alternative high or community day schools. The remaining 10 percent reopened as traditional public schools; usually, this was an immediate conversion from, say, an elementary school to a middle school.
Most charter and specialty schools do not exist primarily to educate the children of a particular neighborhood.
Source: Bee analysis of school directory data from California Department of Education