Costs to close eight Denver schools and reconfigure five others would total $7.6 million to $8.7 million over two years, administrators told the school board Thursday.
The board will vote Nov. 19 on the reform plan, which was unveiled last month as a way to reduce unused classroom space and improve student achievement. The closures are expected to save the district $3.5 million in annual operating costs, the district has said.
However, construction work to retrofit eight schools for the new students would cost an estimated $4.15 million, including about $1 million to prepare six schools for preschoolers, said David Suppes, Denver Public Schools’ chief strategy officer.
“It’s an investment,” he said Thursday, the first time the costs of the reform plan have been unveiled.
Most of the expenses would be the facility improvements.
Suppes said the most of the money would come from the district’s capital reserve fund, which the district hopes to repay through the sale of properties.
