And then there’s Orick.

The picturesque town in northern Humboldt County has a historic school with five classrooms, a gym, a vegetable garden and an expansive play field. Its current enrollment: nine. Its expenses: $118,000 per student per year, more than five times the state average.

California has dozens of school districts with enrollments under 100 and higher-than-average expenses. Most of these districts are in remote areas miles from the next nearest school. But as urban districts grapple with the threat of school closures and the inevitable backlash from families and staff, rural schools face an even more heart-wrenching scenario: close the school and decimate the town.

“Close the school? It comes up all the time,” said Orick Elementary School District Superintendent Justin Wallace. “But I’d say it’s an equity issue. We have families who can’t afford a lot, and this school provides the most consistent setting for our kids. They’re safe, they’re well fed, they’re learning.”

Most of these rural towns once had booming local economies. Logging, ranching, farming, mining and other industries employed generations of families. In the 1960s Orick had 3,000 people and nearly 300 students in its school. There were seven lumber mills, grocery stores, restaurants, churches, even a movie theater.

But as California’s economy changed and jobs in these towns vanished, many communities struggled to find a new purpose. In Orick, the lumber mills gradually closed, the National Park Service claimed much of the surrounding land and residents moved elsewhere. Now, Orick has about 300 people and an average household income that’s just under $39,000 a year — a third of the state average. According to Orick School’s accountability plan, Orick residents “experience high rates of poverty, unemployment, food insecurity, domestic violence, substance abuse, and run-ins with the criminal justice system due to limited resources and high community rates of intergenerational trauma.”

‘Terrified’ of closure

In towns like Orick, the school serves as a savior, of sorts. It’s a community hub, one of the few sources of decent-paying jobs and a symbol of hope for the future. It’s a central part of the town’s identity. The school in Orick operates as a food pantry for the community, gives away clothes to families in need, hosts Narcotics Anonymous meetings and runs a toddler playgroup. The district bought a washer and dryer so residents have a place to do laundry.

Kimberly Frick is the fifth generation in her family to attend Orick School. She remembers when the classrooms were full, students won trophies and the town was like a close-knit family. Now she’s president of the school board and fights to keep the school open. Saving the school, she said, is tantamount to saving the town.

She and Wallace scour the area to find new students for the school. Every time a new family moves to town, they visit and try to persuade them to enroll their children. Other community members chip in, as well, by fixing up homes, keeping the town clean and participating in the volunteer fire department, water district and other local services.

“I feel terrified about the possibility of the school closing. I’d hate to see it happen on my watch,” Frick said. “The facility is clean, safe, well maintained. We provide a high-quality, individualized education for each child.”

Orick, whose name originates from the language of the nearby Yurok tribe, sits in a lush valley along Redwood Creek, nestled between the Pacific Ocean and the Coast Ranges. A herd of about 60 elk roam through the town and are frequent visitors to the school play field. There’s a pizza truck, a small convenience store and a newly refurbished hotel. A rodeo draws crowds every July.

But much of the town is abandoned or dilapidated. A trailer park near the school is strewn with trash and broken furniture. Many of the buildings are boarded up. There’s no gas station. The post office is only open a few hours a day.

Budget breakdown

California funds its schools based on how many students show up every day. But small districts get most of their money in grants, in order to protect them from wild fluctuations in revenue. Last year Orick received $774,000 from the state and federal governments. The school gets extra money because so many of its students have high needs: all are low-income and more than half receive special education services. Some years, numerous students are homeless or in foster care.

Most of the budget goes toward salaries. The school has four full-time staff: two teachers, an administrative assistant and Wallace’s position, which includes serving as superintendent, principal, literacy coach and special education director. A janitor, cook, counselor, special education teacher and after-school teacher all work part time. Maintaining the school buildings is expensive: heating bills can cost $1,100 a month. So is transportation, because everything is far away. When the students take swim lessons, for example, a driver transports them 30 miles south to McKinleyville. Whatever funds are left over go toward student supplies and enrichment activities like field trips.

An obvious way for the state to save money would be to merge Orick School District with its neighbor, Big Lagoon Union Elementary District, 15 miles south. But the merged district would only save money on facility costs and one superintendent’s salary, totaling less than $200,000 a year, because the new merged school would have higher expenses, such as the cost of transporting students 30 miles round-trip every day.

A merger would also alienate one of the communities, Wallace said. Both communities are highly invested in their schools and prize their independence and local control, he said.

How to close a district

In the early 20th century, California had more than 3,500 school districts, each with its own school board, superintendent and unique traditions. To save money, the state gradually winnowed the number down to the 1,000 that exist today. But there are holdouts. Sonoma County, for example, has 40 school districts, some with only a handful of students.

“It’s one of the most common questions we get: Why do we have 40 school districts?” said Eric Wittmershaus, spokesman for the Sonoma County Office of Education. “Everyone in the community agrees it’s too many. The problem is that no one wants to close their school.”

California has a lax attitude toward closing under-enrolled schools. The state lets a district’s average daily attendance slip below six before it intervenes. In those cases, the county can request a temporary waiver, in hopes that enrollment increases, or start the process of consolidating the district with one of its neighbors. But consolidation rarely happens because local officials and voters have the ultimate say.

In 2011, the Legislative Analyst’s Office recommended upping the minimum district size to 100, but the recommendation was never implemented. In fact, Gov. Gavin Newsom’s current budget includes a 20% boost in funding for schools that the state deems to be “ necessary small schools,” which are elementary schools with fewer than 97 students – or high schools with fewer than 287 students – at least 10 miles from the nearest other school.

Grand juries in Santa Clara and Sonoma counties have recommended consolidating small districts to save money, but neither of those reports led to changes.

Still, some experts say that financial realities may force the issue. Enrollment is declining nearly everywhere and it might not be the best use of taxpayer money to pay for half-empty classrooms and deserted playgrounds.

“Do we need to provide a school in every community? A post office? What if that community barely exists?” said Carrie Hahnel, senior associate partner at Bellwether, an education research nonprofit. “We guarantee a free public education to every child, but do we guarantee a school in every community?”

Now and then, districts will shutter. Last year, Green Point Elementary District, deep in the Klamath mountains, consolidated with a neighboring district when its enrollment fell to three (its per-pupil spending was $108,000 a year). In Sonoma County, Kashia Elementary District, with eight students last year, is at risk of closing next year.

Schools reclaimed by nature

Enrollment in Humboldt County has been declining steadily since at least the 1990s, and isn’t expected to rebound any time soon. A century ago the county had about 100 school districts, essentially one in every mill town, but as the mills closed the districts gradually closed, too.

Some of those towns — and their schools — have been swallowed up by the redwood forests. The old logging town of Falk, for example, had a school, mill, post office, dance hall and about 400 residents. After the mill closed, the town gradually emptied out and the Sierra Pacific lumber company, which owned the land, tore down whatever buildings were left in 1979. “Aside from the rose bushes and English ivy, the town of Falk has literally disappeared,” according to the county’s visitor guide.

Michael Davies-Hughes, the county superintendent of schools, encourages small districts to plan ahead to avoid abrupt mid-year closures, which are disruptive to students, families and staff.

“We want districts to be proactive, so they have options,” Davies-Hughes said. “For some, the current model may be increasingly difficult to maintain.”

Outdoor ed and Native traditions

In Orick, older students take a bus 40 minutes every day to attend high school in McKinleyville. Wallace and Frick said it’s unrealistic to put younger children on a bus for long distances, especially in bad weather. Humboldt County has long, dark, rainy winters, with roads often blocked by fallen trees, floods or mudslides.

Besides, Frick and Wallace said, Orick School does a great job educating its students, which is reason enough to keep it open. It has an exemplary outdoor education program, with students going on regular excursions into the nearby wilderness, learning about the local flora and fauna, the seasons and forest ecosystem. They raise trout and steelhead to be released in local waterways, test water quality in the creek and watch pollywogs turn into frogs in classroom terrariums.

Wildlife is all around them. In addition to the elk, students can observe condors and falcons soaring overhead, deer and coyotes hanging around the field and even the occasional bear. Students learn to fish, camp, raft and surf.

About half the students are Native American, and the school offers a robust education in Native traditions and history. A Yurok volunteer comes regularly to teach Yurok culture through activities such collecting acorns and making mash, and extracting pine nuts from pinecones to make beads.

“I mean, come on, how many other schools are in such an incredible setting?” Frick said. “Orick is a great place to go to school.”

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LAS VEGAS (AP) — School district officials in Las Vegas are asking a judge to put an end to what it claims is a coordinated union campaign of teacher absences during a bitter contract battle, forcing school closures and classroom disruptions in a state where it is illegal for public employees to strike.

Since Sept. 1, unexpected staff shortages have forced seven schools to cancel classes for the day and two others to combine classes, according to the Clark County School District, which includes Las Vegas. The district’s motion seeking an emergency court order said one of those schools had 87% of its teachers call out sick on the same day.

“The absentee level at the affected schools is unprecedented,” the motion said, “and these mass sickouts have left students, parents, staff, and administrators scrambling to ensure students’ wellbeing.”

The tense contract negotiations in the nation’s fifth-largest school district are unfolding at a time when labor unions across the country are challenging how workers are treated — from Hollywood’s ongoing writers strike and Detroit ‘s auto production lines to the Los Angeles Unified School District and the Las Vegas Strip.

A state judge is scheduled to consider the Clark County School District’s request Wednesday morning, although it wasn’t immediately clear if a ruling would be issued from the bench or at a later date.

The Clark County Education Association — which represents about 18,000 licensed educators — has denied that it is behind the recent wave of absences. The union said in a statement it would “make its position clear in court” on Wednesday.

In addition to being one of the largest school districts in the U.S., with about 295,000 students, the Clark County School District is the largest in Nevada. It is facing more than 1,100 teacher vacancies.

The education association, however, says vacancies are almost double that if you factor in the open positions that substitute teachers are currently filling.

Contract negotiations have been underway since March over topics such as pay, benefits and working conditions.

Negotiations resumed this week, but ahead of Wednesday’s hearing, the school district announced it had declared an impasse with the teachers union, saying arbitration was now “the only way” to resolve the ongoing fight after 11 unsuccessful bargaining sessions. It called the union’s demands “unaffordable” and “budget-busting.”

Union leaders said they welcome “a third set of eyes” to look over a new contract during arbitration, while also expressing frustration over what they say will likely be a lengthy process before an agreement is reached.

The union is seeking 18% across-the-board pay raises over two years. It also wants additional compensation for special education teachers and teachers in high-vacancy, typically low-income schools, as well as an increased pay rate for teachers working extended-day hours at certain campuses.

The district said its final offer before declaring an impasse included a 9% salary increase during the first year of a new contract, a new pay scale that it says emphasizes college education and years of experience, and other incentives for special education teachers and hard-to-fill positions.

In recent months, negotiations have grown increasingly tense, particularly after the union gave the school district a deadline to reach a contract before the start of the 2023-24 school year.

In Nevada, it is illegal for public employees to strike. But the union had said they would consider taking what they called “work actions” if their deadline wasn’t met, including teachers refusing to work more hours than their contracted work day.

“It is simply not believable that Defendants would threaten targeted work actions for months and have no involvement when those work actions come to pass through their own members’ conduct,” the school district said in its motion.

Meanwhile, thousands of students have already been affected by the wave of teacher absences.

Andrea Brai, whose son was diagnosed with autism, told KVVU-TV last Friday that students’ needs shouldn’t fall by the wayside amid the contract disputes. According to the district, 72% of licensed staff members at Sewell Elementary, where Brai’s son is a student, called in sick that day.

“When you become a teacher,” she said, “you should go into this profession with that in mind.”

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