Hartford Considers Massive School District

An update on a story we brought you earlier this year during the summer. Vermont’s Act 46 is coming to fruition here in our region, as hearings have been held recently in regards to school district consolidation.

To remind you, Act 46 is Vermont state’s plan to adapt to the slowly shrinking amount of students in Vermont schools each year. The number has continually gone down since the 1990s and the state’s school consolidation plan aims to brings school districts together to form larger units, with at least 900 students in each.

One large district was proposed by a Hartford school board member recently that would be 30 miles long down the Connecticut River, from Windsor to Thetford. Without this large district, Hartford High School would risk losing $1.3 million in revenue under Act 46.

Districts who vote on state-approved consolidation plans by July of next year will have incentives by the state. The remaining districts have 4 years, until 2019, to come up with plans or else they face being placed into mergers by the state.