Editor’s note: The following letter was submitted by the Local School Improvement Council of Tennerton Elementary School.

Tennerton Elementary School has once again achieved strong enrollment for the fall of 2025. At a total enrollment of 288 students for fiscal year 2025, it represents the second-largest elementary school in Upshur County.

According to the West Virginia Schools Balanced Scorecard, Tennerton Elementary School well exceeds state standards for English and holds the highest score in the county for mathematics.

These results made the unprecedented proposal to close Tennerton Elementary School and to combine it with Buckhannon Academy Elementary School stunning to families, teachers and students.

The proposal was introduced callously to coincide with open house sessions and one day before the start of school in August — unbeknownst at the time to teachers who had returned to work — making it all the more shocking.

Consolidation typically involves schools with low enrollment or low performance being combined with others. At this scale, it more usually involves new construction of state-of-the-art facilities in more convenient locations. This proposal asks the state for $17,000,000 (with an additional $1,890,000 to be funded by Upshur County) to combine the two largest schools in the county to create one of the largest elementary schools in the entire state, on a 3-acre plot of land in a residential neighborhood already struggling with logistics related to Academy.

Brief mentions of a “parking area” to help with drop-off and pick-up do not adequately address long-standing concerns, nor do construction plans adequately address challenges at this size for lunch, gym, music classes and assembly for these students.

Leadership among first responders has spoken out about serious concerns regarding the proposal.

Buckhannon Chief of Police Matt Gregory commented, “The current traffic situation around Buckhannon Academy School is certainly challenging, especially given the school’s location in the middle of a residential neighborhood. Obviously, with the current difficulties concerning the Academy school traffic, the addition of these vehicles from parents/guardians of former Tennerton students would make the congestion issues exponentially more challenging.”

Buckhannon Fire Chief J.B. Kimble added, “We have had several meetings to discuss the (traffic flow) concerns, with no movement on updating the pick-up model (at Academy). If we were to add additional parents picking up students at the Buckhannon Academy, this would definitely cause additional concern to be able to provide emergency response in this area during the times of drop-off and pick-up.”

School districts around the state are dealing with challenges related to demographics, online learning and impacts of the Hope Scholarship. The initial presentation of this proposal mentioned a $1,000,000 budget shortfall projected for fiscal year 2027. This multi-year project proposes to spend $18,000,000 of state and county monies to make up for that shortfall. At that scale, it would take decades to achieve real savings to the state. The county has raised no money toward this type of construction.

When you consider the experiences of students at Tennerton Elementary School and Buckhannon Academy Elementary School, forced into a facility and area not fit for one of the state’s largest elementary schools, ask yourself: In what way will the experience be better for students? How is this better for the community or the residents who live near Academy?

This proposed consolidation is a very bad solution in search of a bigger problem than exists. For the sake of our excellent teachers, staff and students at Tennerton Elementary, we call on leadership to cease this proposal immediately and to focus on sensible decisions to address budget shortfalls and revenue opportunities that don’t weaken your strongest schools.

Respectfully submitted,
The Local School Improvement Council of Tennerton Elementary School