On weekday mornings I walk my kids half of a mile to school. My three-year-old sits in our wagon, and we all laugh when she calls the leftover full moon “the sun”. A quarter mile from the school, “hellos” to other families begin, and they culminate in a wave given by the Vanderlyn Elementary principal from his post at the edge of the carpool line.
He greets my kindergartener and first grader by name as they speed-walk past, careful not to let their little steps escalate into a run. It’s not exactly Rockwellian – I’m often sharing a look with a neighbor as one of our kids melts over the unfairness of being made to wear a jacket.
But it is community. It’s an overwhelming feeling of togetherness, burden dispersion, and hope. And, in the face of DeKalb County School District’s (DCSD) recent proposal for school closures, it is important to say that, even at some cost, this whole-kid, local, educational effort must be preserved.
I have learned a lot about the public school system since my oldest child started at Vanderlyn Elementary, a neighborhood community school in Dunwoody, currently on the list for closure.
While Dunwoody is a moderately diverse city itself, the Vanderlyn neck of the woods
has a true heterogeneity about it. Our neighbors are Jewish, Christian, and Hindu. My children are close friends with kids who were born in India, France, Chile, and the US Virgin Islands. It is at Vanderlyn Elementary that my kids hold hands, share meals, and create a future with the neighbors they do life with.
Some, namely DCSD, would say neighborhood schools like Vanderlyn are a relic. I think they are a necessity. Research supports my cause. Notably, a 2017 systematic review of 143 research studies examined the overarching impact of community schools (as defined by public schools that are small and localized enough to provide support and services tailored to a local community’s needs) on public education.
This meta-study was a joint effort by The Learning Policy Institute and the National Education Policy Center, and the findings provided overwhelming empirical
evidence that community schools improve attendance, academic outcomes, and reduce achievement gaps.
Vanderlyn Elementary thrives in this neighborhood school model. The school is currently ranked 39th out of approximately 1,800 public elementary schools in the state of Georgia, and operates on a wait-list for PK, K, and 1st grade. It takes some serious mental gymnastics to understand why current DCSD scenarios call for our school to close and split between multiple other elementary schools, one of which is also slated to close.
This leaves our children to attend three different elementary schools in their short grade-school tenure, threatening neighborhoods and student outcomes with uncertainty, change, and disruption of something working nearly perfectly.
It’s poor stewardship by DeKalb County School District on every level- financially, emotionally, and optically. While on the topic of the DCSD, it should be noted that their financial leadership and executive decision-making do not boast a great track record, particularly over the last year.
At the end of 2025, DCSD created national headline news when their superintendent was federally indicted for embezzlement from his prior district, along with wire and tax fraud. This superintendent was already under investigation in his previous district when he was hired by DCSD, something the board was privy to.
This same alleged felon started this Student Assignment Project, and was at
the helm of a seemingly suspect bid process when the consulting firm on the project (HPM) was hired, a firm DCSD has already paid millions to.
If that doesn’t give everyone pause, I don’t know what will. This is the same school board I am asked to trust to make crucial decisions for our children. I wouldn’t say it inspires incredible confidence. Compounding on that distrust, current SAP scenarios remain woefully lacking in clear, transparent data, any construction quotes and/or plans, and acknowledgement that very limited funds are truly available for said “solutions” to underutilization and overcrowding.
In addition, the scenarios fail to account for the rebound of the COVID public school exodus that occurred less than five years ago. One only has to look at the differences in fifth-grade (55-65 kids) and kindergarten (90+ kids) enrollment numbers at many schools (like our home school, Vanderlyn) to see that our public school system still sits decidedly in a recovery phase. Closures in the midst of this rebound will prove short-sighted and very costly.
People don’t want to drop their kindergartners off at trailers on the school’s front lawn, and that is where DCSD is headed again if they don’t take a breath and pause this SAP project.
I will readily concede that figuring out what to do with a breathtakingly large, under-capacity school district stands as a situation ripe with intricacies, many of which I will never fully grasp. I also understand that the district is duty-bound to operate with economic efficiency.
My question, however, is two-part: Are these plans researched and comprehensive enough to understand if these measures are actually economically efficient, and, even if we suspend logic and pretend that they are, at what cost shall we achieve these measures? At what point are willing to kill what is right, good, and actively achieving desired results, all purportedly in pursuit of those exact results?
Are we willing to blindly put our trust into a school board that we can’t earnestly say has earned it? The district should pay attention to the successes of schools
like Vanderlyn Elementary and find a way to maintain and continue the legacy created through neighborhood schools.
If this Student Assignment Project were a Friends episode, it would be
titled “The one where DCSD Shoots Itself In The Foot…Again.” I think this is an episode we’ve seen before, and have no interest in re-watching. It’s time for DeKalb County School District to halt production.
