'Relief cannot come fast enough'

With six schools currently over capacity, both parents and Henrico School Board members have urged Henrico Schools officials to prioritize rebuilding schools in the West End and constructing a new elementary school in the area.

Three elementary schools and three high schools, all located in western Henrico, have more students than the building capacity is meant to hold, according to an HCPS report conducted Sept. 30. Several schools are also nearing 100% capacity, with 14 schools at over 90% capacity, four of which are above 98% capacity.

At a school board meeting Nov. 9, board members reviewed the division’s Capital Improvement Plan for Fiscal Year 2024-2025, which designates five schools to be rebuilt or renovated and two new schools to be constructed by 2029 through funds from the 2022 bond referendum. The bond referendum, which voters "overwhelmingly" approved according to the school board, designates four West End schools to be rebuilt or renovated by 2026 and a new West End elementary school to be constructed by 2029.

But Three Chopt District school board member Micky Ogburn said that something must be done sooner. She said she is mainly concerned about the new West End elementary school not opening until 2030, especially since many elementary schools in the West End currently are overcrowded.

“We’ve got four schools that are right at the brink [in Three Chopt],” Ogburn said. “We have schools in the district that have trailers – multiple of them – and they’re bursting at the seams.”

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According to the fall 2023 report, six schools in the West End have student populations that surpass the building capacities: Douglas S. Freeman High (at 104.5% capacity), Pemberton Elementary (102.9% capacity), Deep Run High (102.1% capacity), Three Chopt Elementary (101.2% capacity), Glen Allen High (101% capacity), and Colonial Trail Elementary (100.1% capacity).

Four other West End schools are almost at capacity: Rivers Edge Elementary (99.9% capacity), J.R. Tucker High (99.4% capacity), Maybeury Elementary (98.3% capacity), and Skipwith Elementary (98.2% capacity).

On the other hand, schools with the lowest capacity rates, some near or less than 50%, are all located in Eastern Henrico: Henrico High (66.3% capacity), Fairfield Middle (64.8% capacity), Elko Middle (64.7% capacity), Mehfoud Elementary (55.6% capacity), John Rolfe Middle (49.3% capacity), and Varina Elementary at 37.9%, the lowest capacity rate in the county.

(Click here to view capacity rates at Henrico elementary schools.)

(Click here to view capacity rates at Henrico middle schools.)

(Click here to view capacity rates at Henrico high schools.)

The stark contrast between the West End’s overcrowded schools and Eastern Henrico’s low capacity rates show that Henrico County does have enough space for its students, just not in the areas that need it, Ogburn said.

“There is room for all of our students, but it’s not in the right place,” she said.

The timeline for the upcoming projects slates Jackson Davis Elementary (89.6% capacity) and Longan Elementary (94.4% capacity) to be rebuilt by 2026 to create more space for students. Quioccasin Middle will also be rebuilt over the 2024-2025 school year. The school board has already approved schematic designs for Davis and Longan and a $6 million contract to redesign Quioccasin.

HCPS has also slated Highland Springs Elementary to be rebuilt over the 2027-2028 school year and two new elementary schools to be built: one in Fairfield during the 2026-2027 school year and one in the West End during the 2028-2029 school year.

Rebuilding Davis and Longan likely will create enough space for students, Tuckahoe District school board member Marcie Shea said, but the problem will be ensuring that more students will attend the schools where space is available.

“I think overall, especially with the new expanded capacity coming at Jackson Davis and Longan, we’re going to have enough capacity, but it’s getting the people where the capacity is,” she said.

However, HCPS Superintendent Amy Cashwell assured board members that schools are actually meant to function at 100% capacity – although she said that her team would continue to monitor schools that have capacity rates in the 90s.

“Technically, if a school’s at 100% capacity, they’re functioning as they were built to function,” she said. “You would want to start looking at schools in the 90s and examining membership trends, but at 90%, it wouldn’t indicate that there’s an issue with crowding in the building.”

Cashwell also said that for many smaller schools, capacity rates can fluctuate from the 90s to 100% by only five to 10 students. She said that for high schools, capacity rates do not always reflect the day-to-day population of the school, as many students attend the Advanced Career Education Centers or other specialty programs outside of their school buildings

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Ogburn, however, said that high capacity rates have had a significant impact on students and families. At the board meeting, Ogburn read an email that she received from a Rivers Edge parent who said that overcrowding at the school had placed many limitations on parent and family involvement.

“Relief cannot come fast enough for Rivers Edge Elementary,” the parent wrote. “The enrollment size is given as the reason parents can no longer come to have lunch with their children. Music performances are recorded and emailed home to parents. Parents are not permitted to see performances live.”

The parent also expressed concerns that overcrowding only would continue to increase with new housing developments being built in neighborhoods near the school.

“The problem is going to get much worse…Something has to give much sooner than later,” they wrote. “I am so disheartened that these precious elementary years have been so impacted by overcrowding and school leadership decisions. It just gets worse every year.”

“This is the thing that I hear over and over from parents in that area,” Ogburn said.

Board chair and Brookland District representative Kristi Kinsella said that students in her district had also faced overcrowding – some for almost all of their K-12 experience.

“The kids that are seniors right this moment at Glen Allen High School have been honestly overcrowded in schools over 100% capacity since kindergarten,” she said.

Cashwell, however, said that both state and local trends show that public school enrollment has decreased and will continue to decline in future years. Last year, HCPS reported a student population of 48,977, but that number dropped slightly to 48,949 this year. Between 2015 and 2019, HCPS had a student population of more than 50,000.

“You’re looking at shrinking enrollment as a locality, probably over the next five to 10 years,” Cashwell said. “But we’ve got pressure points now we have to solve.”

Despite the overall decline of public school enrollment in Henrico and Virginia – particularly due to a declining birth rate across the state – new housing developments continue to pop up in the West End, Ogburn said. With new developments planned in the Brookland District and the northern part of the Three Chopt District, Ogburn said she is worried that the problem will only get worse.

“That’s honestly what concerns me – the growth and the development of what is to come,” she said. “Look at what’s already overcrowded, and nearby are new housing developments. You drive by those blue signs that say we’re rezoning and there’s another development going in, and my first response is, ‘Where are those kids going to school?’”

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Board vice-chair and Varina District representative Alicia Atkins also raised concern about another issue – building maintenance. HCPS officials reported that 72.6% of the system's facilities are more than 30 years old, and 60.3% of facilities are more than 50 years old. Atkins said she worries that if more schools in Eastern Henrico are not prioritized for renovation, families will continue to move over to the West End, where more schools are slated to be rebuilt in the next few years.

“We certainly need to address the needs that I’m hearing over in Three Chopt and Tuckahoe, hands down. That’s today,” Atkins said. “But we’re going to continue to see a shift from specific areas to other areas not just because of programming, but [because] it’s looking like the place they want to be in.”

At an Oct. 26 school board meeting, Atkins said she wanted John Rolfe Middle, which is not on the list of bond referendum projects but has been placed on a list of long-range planning projects to be looked at during the 2031-2032 school year, to be designated as a higher priority for renovation.

“Both John Rolfe and Quioccasin middle schools were constructed in the 1970s,” she said. “I know we have a process that we use so that we are using a system that makes sense so that we can do the best we can to be fair, however, there are always other important factors.”

Along with John Rolfe, 16 other schools have been placed on the long-range planning list to be looked at and eventually renovated between 2029 and 2034. HCPS officials have not yet identified a funding source for these projects, which eventually could come from passage of one or several future bond referendum. That has been the funding mechanism for a number of previous school renovation or rebuild projects.

(Click here to view Henrico schools designated for long-range planning.)

According to HCPS Chief of Operations Lenny Pritchard, supply chain issues and funding limitations forced John Rolfe Middle to be placed further back on the list of schools. Cashwell said that HCPS will prioritize a pre-planning study on John Rolfe immediately.

“The needs are great across our county at our schools,” Cashwell said. “I know if folks from Carver [Elementary] were here, they would be telling us very much about their needs.”

Fairfield District board member Roscoe Cooper said that HCPS does its best to be equitable when renovating and constructing new schools in the county. In 2021, HCPS opened two new high school buildings – one for J.R. Tucker High in the West End and another for Highland Springs High in Eastern Henrico.

“I just want to say that I take pride in the fact that Henrico County, a few years ago, made sure that we built two new high schools simultaneously on both sides of the county.” Cooper said. “We sat there and made it clear: ‘We’re not building a new Tucker without a new Highland Springs.’”

Despite new school buildings coming to the West End in the next few years, Ogburn said she continues to be concerned about whether it will make a difference in schools that are growing more overcrowded by the day.

“I’m just not quite sure it’s going to be enough that we’ll relieve the overcrowding that exists,” she said. “I just want to be sure that we don’t forget that at the end of the day, the decisions that we make affect a child sitting in a seat and their overall school experience.”

The school board will next convene at a 1 p.m. work session on Dec. 14 and a monthly meeting at 6:30 p.m. that same day for a final review of the CIP and bond referendum projects. The board will also hold a 5:30 p.m. public input session that day about the 2024-2025 Annual Financial Plan.

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Liana Hardy is the Citizen’s Report for America Corps member and education reporter. Her position is dependent upon reader support; make a tax-deductible contribution to the Citizen through RFA here.