- Cleveland Metropolitan School District
- Building Brighter Futures Planning - org
- Building Brighter Futures Planning
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We recently completed our first round of community engagement for Building Brighter Futures. Thank you to everyone who attended a regional in-person meeting or a districtwide virtual meeting. See below our presentation materials, meeting photos, and summaries of the feedback we received. We look forward to continuing to engage the community through the summer and fall.CMSD has made measurable progress.We value the community’s trust as CMSD provides quality education for all students. As we assess resources and enrollment, we see opportunities to better align facilities with current needs. This alignment will help manage costs and direct more resources to education and instruction.Together, we can make strategic decisions to invest in our schools, ensuring equitable access to high-quality education, enhancing the student experience, and supporting teaching and learning. While some choices may be challenging, our collective efforts will create a sustainable, student-centered plan to BUILD BRIGHTER FUTURES for our scholars.
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Student Experience
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Clear pathways for post-secondary readiness
While some choices may be challenging, our collective efforts will create a sustainable, student-centered plan to BUILD BRIGHTER FUTURES for our scholars.
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Opportunities to follow co-curricular passions
While some choices may be challenging, our collective efforts will create a sustainable, student-centered plan to BUILD BRIGHTER FUTURES for our scholars.
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Supported teachers and staff
We value the community’s trust as CMSD provides quality education for all students. As we assess resources and enrollment, we see opportunities to better align facilities with current needs. This alignment will help manage costs and direct more resources to education and instruction.
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Buildings worthy of our scholars and staff
While some choices may be challenging, our collective efforts will create a sustainable, student-centered plan to BUILD BRIGHTER FUTURES for our scholars.
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Resources
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Frequently Asked Questions
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What is Building Brighter Futures?
Building Brighter Futures is a planning process that seeks to improve our schools, while also ensuring the school district’s financial sustainability.
Right now, we are in a perfect storm of serious challenges. Costs are increasing, while funding is being cut. Our enrollment has been declining for decades, more than 50% in the last 20 years.
We believe we have an opportunity and a responsibility to act in a way that actually improves the experience of our students.
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Are we going to close, consolidate, or merge schools?
This process will lead to recommendations to consolidate, close, and merge schools. We have seen a steady decline in enrollment over the last decade, and that reduces the amount of funding available and the experiences we can provide to students. This perfect storm means we have to make some tough decisions now.
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How many schools will you consolidate? Which schools will be impacted?
We are at the beginning of this process, so no recommendations have been made. There is still much work to do to engage our community and continue to review our data. We believe we have too many school buildings for our current enrollment, but we do not have a recommendation yet on the number of buildings that will be impacted.
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When will a final decision be made?
We will continue to engage the community through the Spring and Summer and into the Fall. After reviewing all of the feedback and our data, we will make recommendations to the CMSD Board before the end of this calendar year. Recommendations from this process will not result in any schools being closed for next school year (2025-26). Any changes will take effect for the 2026-2027 school year.
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What will actually improve for students, staff, and families?
While we have many bright spots to celebrate, we know that these great experiences are not available to all our students across all of our schools. We have work to do. We envision a brighter future, with strong enrollment in all of our buildings. This creates more and better opportunities at all our schools. Some of those improved opportunities could be:
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More college and career opportunities for high school students
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More arts, career exploration, and advanced courses at K-8s
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More activities outside of school hours
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More student support
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More teacher collaboration and specialization
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All students and staff in warm, safe, and dry buildings
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How will CMSD decide which schools to consolidate, close, or merge? What will this be based on?
Recommendations will be based on a wide range of data and informed by community context and input. The primary data will be student enrollment - both current and historical trends - as well as building utilization and building condition. The district has also assembled a long list of additional data points and context to ensure we are considering a more complete picture of our schools and buildings. These include academic outcomes, school programs and models, as well as the unique characteristics of each building and the surrounding neighborhood. However, we know that no single piece of data tells the full picture of a school. A big part of the community engagement is to help the district build out all of the additional data and context we need to make the best recommendations.
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What will happen to the teachers and other staff at schools that are being closed?
The district will do everything we can to keep as many of our valued employees as possible. We anticipate that normal, year-over-year attrition will create available positions for many of the employees impacted by school consolidations. There will be transitions for staff, and the district will offer dedicated support and clear information to help people navigate this process. We will also work closely with CTU and support staff unions to communicate changes clearly and openly.
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If my school is closed, can my team of teachers and other staff travel together with our students to one receiving school?
We completely understand the desire for our staff to stay with their students. In some cases, that may be possible, if we believe most of the students will choose one school and there is enough space in the welcoming school building. However, because students have the choice to enroll anywhere in the district, and because most of our buildings are so small, we can not guarantee that all staff will be able to travel together as a team to one school. We will share much more information about how staff assignments will be handled in the coming months, well before any recommendations are made.
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If my student’s school is closed, where will he/she go to school?
As a reminder, the schools that are recommended to close as part of this process will not be closed until the following school year: 2026-27. We will spend the entire next school year working closely with students and families to ensure every student has a high-quality school to attend in 2026-27. We will share detailed information on school options and timelines as soon as possible after the recommendations are approved.
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For the students at closed schools, will they receive transportation to their new school?
Our current policy is to provide transportation to students that live within 1-3 miles of the school they attend.
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What else is CMSD doing to address its financial situation, besides just closing schools?
By law, every school district in Ohio must provide a balanced five-year forecast. The district has made budget reductions in excess of $90 million, including cutting central office costs by more than 13%, along with holding the line on school budgets. Thanks to voters, we secured an additional levy and bond issue to support operations and facilities. The work CMSD has done to improve its financial situation recently resulted in an increase in our S&P bond rating from BBB+ to A-. This upgrade in our bond rating will save the district up to $750,000 in interest payments. However, there is more work to be done. The Building Brighter Futures process is another necessary step to continue to improve the financial picture, streamlining operations and removing the burden of too many buildings.
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How has CMSD reduced spending at the central office?
We reduced central office positions by 12.6% entering this year. We put additional controls in place for contracts, staff travel, and furniture. Out of state staff travel, one of our smallest non-personnel categories, is down 50% YTD, although it represents approximately 0.06% of General Fund spending. Contract spending in 2025 is on track to be more than $10 million lower than we projected.
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Why can’t CMSD cancel its central office lease at 1111 Superior and move to an underutilized school?
The current lease was renewed in 2023 prior to Dr. Morgan’s arrival and runs through July 2028. Terminating the current lease early would be cost prohibitive. We are examining all non-CMSD-owned leases for any flexibilities. We are working with the 1111 office landlord to explore how to make the most efficient use under that lease.
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CMSD recently held regional in-person community meetings and district-wide virtual meetings. What did CMSD learn from the community feedback?
We were pleased to welcome approximately 476 families, staff, and community members to our in-person and virtual meetings during the month of April. We requested feedback through small group table discussions and a survey. Here are some of the key insights from the community’s feedback:
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Participants were engaged with the data. They asked insightful questions and wanted this information to be widely shared.
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They wanted more transparency about how we would use this data to make decisions.
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If having fewer schools becomes necessary, they favored mergers over closures.
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They wanted clear explanations for why the recommendations are necessary.
Community members also expressed concerns about the potential impacts of school closures. Some of the most commonly expressed concerns were supporting students through change, safety, class sizes, impacts on all employees and especially their child’s teacher, transportation, competition with charter schools, and reuse of closed buildings. Participants expressed pride in their neighborhood schools and a desire to keep the programs and people that made them successful. They also want speciality schools to be maintained and strengthened.
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How will the feedback that CMSD received during the community meetings inform this planning process?
It is important that we reflect on the feedback we received and take informed actions to respond as we move forward. Some of the key actions planned include the following:
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Share more data, including school-level data, on the website and in future engagement opportunities
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Explain in more detail how and when we will make recommendations.
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Continue to seek ways to protect and strengthen the unique characteristics and offerings that make schools special and are delivering results for students
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Deeply analyze and share more information on how potential recommendations would impact the critical issues raised by community members, including class size, transportation, safe environments for students and staff, enrollment competition, and building reuse
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Seek more feedback from our stakeholders about their concerns and provide more detailed explanations and processes for how we will support them through these changes, with a continued focus on students and staff
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Expand the voices heard by proactively seeking out our families, students, staff, and community
We will continue to update the Building Brighter Futures website and this FAQ throughout this process as we learn more from the community and have more detailed guidance to share.
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In the News
Apr. 21, 2025 by Jack Berney - SpectrumNews1 - ClevelandApril 15, 2025 by Michael Indriolo, Signal ClevelandPosted: Apr 10, 2025 by: Melissa Reid, Fox 8March 24, 2025 by Michael Indriolo, Signal ClevelandMarch 24, 2025 Ideastream Public Media | By Conor MorrisMarch 23, 2025 by Michael Indriolo, Signal ClevelandMarch 18, 2025 Ideastream Public Media | By Conor MorrisMarch 18, 2025 by Michael Indriolo, Signal ClevelandMarch 12, 2025 by Michael Indriolo, Signal ClevelandMarch 6, 2025 by Michael Indriolo, Signal ClevelandMarch 4, 2025 Ideastream Public Media | By Conor MorrisFebruary 26, 2025 by Michael Indriolo, Signal ClevelandFebruary 25, 2025 Ideastream Public Media | By Conor MorrisJanuary 29, 2025 by Michael Indriolo, Signal ClevelandDecember 17, 2024 by Michael Indriolo and Cleveland Documenters, Signal ClevelandPublished October 22, 2024 Ideastream Public Media | By Conor Morris