What is usually a celebratory last day of school carries a heavier feeling across Austin ISD, as students, parents and alumni say goodbye to 10 neighborhood schools set to permanently close their doors Thursday amid the district’s worsening budget crisis.

Families connected to the eight elementary and two middle schools spent their final weeks of classes packing classrooms, revisiting old hallways and gathering for farewell celebrations before the campuses shut down for good. Trustees voted in November to close the schools in hopes of saving roughly $20 million as the district confronts a projected $181 million budget shortfall. However, the closures did little to ease fears about deeper cuts ahead, especially after district leaders later announced plans to cut about 200 campus-based positions.

Now, as Austin ISD considers whether some of the schools could be sold, leased or repurposed, many families say they are mourning more than the school buildings. They worry the closures could permanently reshape neighborhood identities and fracture communities built over generations.

Earlier this month, Austin ISD released the analysis examining possible futures for six closing campuses identified as potentially surplus. The review considered community input, market value and facility conditions to determine whether schools would be better suited for sale, redevelopment or adaptive reuse. Sunset Valley Elementary ranked among the campuses mostly likely to be sold, though trustees must still approve any final decision. Other closing schools could temporarily house students and staff displaced by future bond construction projects.

Superintendent Matias Segura has said the district does not plan additional school closures before a future districtwide redrawing of school boundaries.

“Given the challenges we have taken on recently, I cannot put additional strain on our community that might detract from this strong progress,” Segura said in a letter to families.

Sunset Valley families fear what comes next

On a sunny May afternoon at Sunset Valley Elementary, children raced between water slides and bubble machines while alumni returned to perform for one final school celebration. Beneath the music and stacks of pizza boxes, many families were quietly grieving the loss of the South Austin campus.

Maria Rodriguez Arellano, a special education teacher at the school, said in Spanish she was heartbroken to say goodbye to the community built around the school.

“We are really sad,” Arellano said in Spanish. “Parents have shared with teachers that students are very sad, very worried about whether they will see their friends and teachers again. It is a big change, and many are asking us ‘what is going to happen to this school, this building? Are we never going to be able to come back?’”

Zoe Trieff, whose fourth-grade son is her last of her four children to attend Sunset Valley, said she understands why the district is consolidating schools, but believes the closures reflect a broader statewide school funding issue. She said many parents don’t understand how Texas funds schools or how those funding pressures led campuses like Sunset Valley to the brink of closure and possible future sale.

“I don’t think they understand that this is the first domino that is falling and there are going to be so many more,” Trieff said. “What other cuts are they going to make? When are they going to have to get rid of librarians and coaches and anything not state mandated?”

Georgia Hernandez attended Sunset Valley in the early 2000s alongside her siblings and still regularly visits the campus because her goddaughter now attends the school. Hernandez said she met the child’s mother as classmates at Sunset Valley years ago.

Standing beside her former kindergarten teacher, Hernandez said Sunset Valley was a unique and special place because of the care teachers showed students and the quality of teachers that the school recruited.

Hernandez said she cried when she learned the school would close, realizing her own future children would never attend the campus that shaped so much of her childhood.

“It is such a weird thing to say that there is elementary pride in me,” Hernandez said. “Hopefully where all the teachers of this school go, they carry that Sunset Valley love into the schools that they go to.”

Oak Springs Elementary leaves old building behind

Across town, at Oak Springs Elementary, former students shared similar memories of growing up alongside the campus. Travis County Pct. 1 Constable Tonya Nixon said she still frequents the school for career day events to encourage students who remind her of herself. Nixon said she grew up just down the street from the school and remembers walking there with her grandmother before spending afternoons on the old playground’s merry-go-round.

Nixon said Oak Springs helped shape her confidence long before she became the first Black woman in Central Texas to hold a constable badge. As a student, she earned the title of “dynamic dolphin,” an award given to standout students.

“It was lovely,” she said. “I hate to see it being closed but I know it is going to be rebuilt.”

Annitha Taban, another Oaks Springs alumna who graduates high school this year before attending The University of Texas at Austin, said the school set high expectations that continued shaping her long after elementary school.

“Every teacher here always set a high standard for me, they always had me working my hardest even if I was trying to be lazy that day or being disruptive,” Taban said. “I took that from middle school onwards. I was always like ‘these people always believed in me, they always pushed me to my hardest, why do I have to stop just because I left elementary?’”

Taban said the school’s warmth and familiarity stayed with her long after she left, qualities she now hopes to recreate for others. Even with a new Oak Springs campus planned, she said it was jarring to learn the current building will disappear so soon after her own time there ended and knowing she will no longer see the mural she helped create in elementary school.

“I live across the street so I see this school every day walking to the corner store and my little sister gets dropped off here for her bus stop for middle school,” Taban said. “This is where my personality started forming, being as outgoing as I am. It is good that it is an upgrade, new facilities, but nothing is wrong with this school. I know it is old but this place carries so many memories, it holds a lot of stuff for people.”

District weighs future of shuttered campuses

Austin ISD has identified six closing campuses as potentially surplus properties and evaluated them for future reuse based on the community input, facility conditions, historical significance and market value. The analysis comes as Austin ISD seeks to generate an estimated $50 million next fiscal year through property monetization to offset its budget shortfall. This, Segura said earlier this year, could include selling or leasing surplus properties beyond the schools now closing.

Oak Springs will eventually reopen in a newly renovated building funded through the district’s $2.4 billion 2022 bond program and will become the permanent home for both the Oak Springs and Blackshear elementary communities. Blackshear Elementary is expected to close in 2028, once the new Oak Springs building is completed.

Other campuses not marked as surplus could temporarily house students and staff displaced at schools currently under construction.