I was involved in this story a few years ago, and can share some background.

The county is definitely experiencing a demographic transition: fewer kids, older folks living longer. That makes it harder to support schools.

When I was on the Ripton and county school boards, there was a divide about closing schools. Some said they couldn't be financially justified, while others argued that closing a school would kill its community.

I recall vividly several folks, both in Ripton and Middlebury, swearing they wouldn't close schools... and now they are pushing for just that.

I’m not very familiar with the Ripton area. How far away are the two closest elementary schools if theirs shuts down? Jericho closed Underhill ID and diverted students to Jericho Elementary and Underhill Central. I don’t remember the exact numbers but UID had fewer than 80 students I believe, maybe even less. People threw a shit fit over it but it was the right thing to do. It didn’t make sense for the tax payers to keep an entire school open when each town had another school to pull students into. The building is still there if we ever get a mass influx of elementary aged kids (doubtful, sadly).

TLDR: angst over separating from then rejoining school district.

Not too far, but over mountain roads...

For general context - the district in question has seven towns, each with their own elementary school, ranging in size from less than 50 students in the building (Ripton and Weybridge, last I knew) to something on the order of 300-400 (Middlebury), with the next largest somewhere around 100 and the others in the 50-100 range. Most are a little less 10 miles away from the school in their neighboring town, with the closest two being Weybridge and Middlebury (less than 4 miles apart). I don't think any single school has the capacity to suddenly take on the entire student body of another school, but if I'm remembering the meetings from several years ago correctly, if school lines were not tied directly to the town lines, all students could be served in something like four schools without additional construction. (Obviously there are other factors and it's not as simple as "well, just do that, then!")

The elementary schools in Middlebury and Salisbury are each 8-9 miles away from Ripton, or a 15 minute drive in good weather. Some additional factors: The road up to Ripton isn't easy in bad weather, and since Hancock and Granville (not in the same school district) don't have elementary schools of their own, many of their elementary-age kids go to Ripton. Some portion of the older kids from those towns do go to the middle & high school in Middlebury, which looks like a 30-minute drive in good weather (direct drive, not considering bus routes). Should the needs of students in a totally different district be a factor? That's up for debate, as with so many other things.

The article says there were 45 students there this year (a few of whom presumably don't live in Ripton itself, as described above, but I don't know how many that would be). That's actually a few more kids than I expected. I remember when the student body dipped below 50 kids a few years ago, I was jokingly-but-not-really told not to advertise that fact. That was when it was a PK-6th school. The school district then moved all 6th graders to the middle school, and discontinued the PK program in some buildings, including Ripton. At the time, I remember hearing that that put their student population in the 30s, but since the article says 45, my numbers must not be the most up-to-date.

This is not me advocating for any particular outcome - just figured I had some info (too much info, ha) and might as well share!

E: missed a word.

I understand the desire to keep a local school but someone has to pay for it, and it's not these towns. It's not clear why the rest of the state has to support this

That is the agonizing question.
It ties directly into Vermont's population problem.

I'm critical of keeping p these schools but I could see a case made for keeping them to attract newcomers. However that would also require more housing.

It would. But Vermont has - for years - refused to take even the most elementary steps to reverse demographic decline.

Instead, the default idea is that Vermont is a charming retirement state, where old folks can live out their years in the company of small farmers. (Said farmers are often at the edge of collapse, but we won't talk about that)

I agree completely. It's very frustrating. And many simultaneously oppose increased school funding

I grew up in a town with a now closed high school and it's mind boggling to me to think of what the bus times must be now. I was already on the bus an hour every afternoon just to get home and that was only 6 miles out of town and didn't require going up roads like 125 over the mountain.

Alas, I've seen that from retiree communities across the US.

Not all of them, but enough. "I've paid my dues. Not gonna pay for someone else's kids."

This happened in the town I live in. We had about 50-60 kids in k-6 grade school. We were told combine with two other towns and it will save us all money on property taxes as well as overall burden. Otherwise state stops helping fund. Ok. I’m for saving money and having 12 kids in class instead of 8 was fine by me as the teacher my son had would be moving up a grade and going to the new school. The reality is they kept two of the three schools open and my property taxes went up. Not down. None of the three schools were big enough to take all 7 grades of the three towns. The real problem is the excessive school districting and with it the excessive pay that the superintendents and staff make that are sucking valuable money away from teachers and teachers support staff. We have 60 districts in this state which is just ridiculous and with that 60 supers and staff. We could really cut that number down as they don’t actually help but jay create more barriers for teachers to teach to their classes

I'm sorry to hear it.

60 is, what, 1/2 of what we had a decade ago?

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I just wish they would have been truthful with us from the start. I didn’t mind conglomerating schools because eventually all kids end up at a union high school so why aren’t we doing union grade schools? With enrollment going down we should really look to get rid of this wasteful system of districts

I think some folks made the cold calculation that closing schools looks bad politically, to communities, so they either said nothing or proclaimed they wouldn't do so... until they had the opportunity to shut them down.

If you look back the promise was for something like 5 years.

Lincoln is currently going through this but even worse. They're literally trying to merge with any district but their neighbors.

Nobody I spoke to then gave out an expiration date.

I could never figure out Lincoln-Ripton relations. Ripton always felt pointed to the west, east, and south - but not the north.