By Lee Corey,
Web Editor.
Santa Rosa High School has been the largest school in the Santa Rosa City Schools District for as long as most can remember, but that is quickly changing. Recently the student population at SRHS has dropped below 1,600 students for the first time in recent history. Additionally, Maria Carrillo High School recently surpassed SRHS in student population. What is going on with our school population, and how will it affect our school in coming years?
Explanations for the declining population are numerous, and none are definitive. A declining birthrate in Santa Rosa and California in general, an increase in online schooling and independent study, and an increase in transfer students might all be contributing factors to the declining student population at SRHS.
Our principal, Dr. Mark Ryan, commented on the situation, saying, “Declining enrollment affects staffing, funding, programs, services—literally everything. The fewer students means fewer of all of those things.” Less demand for every service our school provides will result in significant changes to all aspects of our school. The declining population is taken into consideration in the master facilities plan for the remodeling of SRHS. “Fewer students are the reason the master facilities plan calls for removal of all of the portables and moving various functions currently in portable into the existing permanent buildings,” said Ryan.
The greatest short-term change to our school will be the staffing changes. Multiple sections, or groups of class periods, have been cut from next year’s schedule. “[It] is a drop of a bit more than 25% of sections from this year. That means we will have at least eight fewer teachers,” explained Ryan. This is a very significant change, and it will greatly impact our school.
Though the declining population will have some negative effects on our school, Ryan remains positive about the future of SRHS and is open to all different perspectives on the issue. “My personal goal would be to recruit and retain more students. But I am just one person with one opinion, and there are many people who have input to how we respond to this situation,” he said. Some of his ideas include expanding and advertising programs that attract students to our school, like career technical education, dual enrollment opportunities and an alternative education program, among other things.
Our principal emphasized that the most important solution to this problem in his view is to get out the good news about all of the amazing programs and classes at SRHS. “We keep losing students and families who get disenchanted with the school or who become disenfranchised and disengaged. It is my opinion that we need to work together with our entire staff, student body, families, alumni and community stakeholders to collaboratively identify which of these (and other) ideas are worth pursuing, and we need to take action now to stem this tide and try to reverse it,” said Ryan. While declining enrollment may affect our school negatively, awareness of it could also spur positive change, and with administrators like Dr. Mark Ryan looking for solutions, the future looks bright for SRHS.
