What was expected to be a packed house in the Sahuaro High School gym Monday night turned out to be only a half-full discussion on the consolidation and closure process of up to 10 schools in the Tucson Unified School District.
The meeting was the first of three community engagement sessions the district planned for this week, all of which hit maximum registration numbers of 200-300 by Monday. But with roughly 150 people present at Sahuaro High, the district lifted its capacity restrictions Tuesday for the upcoming Wednesday and Saturday meetings. Communications director Karla Escamilla told AZPM they’re “hoping to get more families to participate.”
Around 20 tables were filled across the gym floor, each manned with a staff facilitator, parents, other staff members and residents. Each group was prompted to write down their answers to questions related to school enrollment decisions, student learning and maintaining equity within the district, among other issues.
Arizona is already the lowest among all states in per-pupil funding, and further decline has led TUSD to consider shutting some schools down or making grade range adjustments.
But the district, led by superintendent Gabriel Trujillo, says the consolidation conversation is less about budget and more about supporting student opportunities.
“It’s a very, very painful moment, and we want to acknowledge that, but it’s for the righteous cause: the pursuit of excellence and educational experiences for all of our students,” he told the crowd Monday.
As participants had small discussions about what services they wanted carried through the consolidation process and what their major concerns were with closures, district employees and all five TUSD board members perused the floor nodding their heads and taking notes.
Some community members shared their desire for the district to continue transportation, Special Education, Fine Arts and dual-language programming if schools that offer those programs are closed.
The district says its declining enrollment is the result of an exodus to private and charter schools, in addition to falling birth rates. Officials have put a particular emphasis on the demographics of Tucson’s east side, saying its aging population has prevented sufficient enrollment in the area.
“TUSD's enrollment gets stronger as you go south and southwest and, of course, gets weaker the further east that you move. And I think any demographer or anybody looking at TUSD enrollment boundaries and housing permits and new subdivisions and where folks are buying homes, you're going to see that trend very clearly,” Trujillo told AZPM in February.
Jabril Thomas was one of the parents involved in the discussions. His two children attend elementary school in the district. Thomas is also a former TUSD employee and said he’s skeptical of the closure process.
“What I’ve seen over time is the district divest itself from the Pantano region — so eastside schools — and allow for charter schools to take command and then complain that there’s not enough families or school age children for them to justify keeping schools open,” Thomas told AZPM before the meeting started.
Thomas himself, grew up in Tucson and graduated through TUSD. He attended Reynolds Elementary School, which was closed in 2010 and sold in 2016. Today it’s home to the Sonoran Science Academy, a K-8 charter school.
He then attended Carson Middle School, another TUSD school that was closed in 2013 and demolished this summer to make way for new housing units.
At the high school Thomas graduated from in 2007, Santa Rita, enrollment dropped from over 1,000 students in 2010 to just 370 last year. The Arizona Department of Education does not provide enrollment data collected prior to the 2010 school year.
Bill de la Cruz of third-party consultant De la Cruz Leadership Solutions, however, said there were 9,500 fewer students enrolled in Pima County public schools in the 2024-2025 school year than there were in the 2006-2007 school year.
Thomas said that students from one school who are consolidating into another are likely to experience a “reshaping of identity.” He said the district has missed many opportunities to compete with charter schools through marketing strategies.
“I've never received a flyer in the mail. I've never even seen as much as a Reel on Facebook. I've never seen a Reel on Instagram. These are places that, for little to no cost, you can make an enormous impact, especially on the students, on the youth that would be your immediate service recipient,” Thomas said.
At the same time, Thomas said he hopes the district will “close its mouth and listen” to community concerns. He also wants to see more readily accessible raw data that led the district to start the consolidation process.
The district has provided some data on its Reconfiguration Committee page.
Community members can register for Wednesday’s meeting at Cholla High School from 4-6:30 p.m. and Saturday’s meeting at Tucson High School from 9-11:30 a.m.
