Walnut Creek reclaims former school

An enrollment influx in Walnut Creek has garnered enough students to rationalize an additional school in the district.

Walnut Creek School District trustees recently voted to to let the Dorris-Eaton School’s lease of the former Parkmead Intermediate School expire in June 2015 and use the facility for students.

Walnut Creek had previously faced declining enrollment just a few years ago. That trend has reversed.

The reversal has created overcrowding at local schools. Walnut Creek School District Superintendent Patty Wool explained that the campuses in the district weren’t originally designed to hold a high volume of students:

“We have increased by 500 students (since 2007) and that constitutes an elementary school, and yet we did not open elementary school. So taking the school back is so critical.”

New schools aren’t cheap. The estimated price tag to bring a new school up to snuff is $900,000. That’s not including the cost of about $565,000 a year to operate, which doesn’t factor the cost of teachers and supplies.

These costs are projected to take place at the start of the 2015-2016 fiscal year.