 - The Lander School Board voted this month to mothball Jeffrey City Elementary School, pending future enrollments.){kind=link}
(Lander, WY) – The Lander School Board voted this month to mothball Jeffrey City Elementary School, pending future enrollments.
The decision will now go before the Wyoming School Facilities Commission for approval, local officials said.
No enrollments
During a board meeting April 21, Superintendent Mike Harris reported that no students have signed up to attend Jeffrey City Elementary for the 2026-2027 school year – a trend that has remained consistent since 2022-2023.
He noted, however, that if students do express interest in enrolling at the school, the board can reverse its decision to mothball the facility at any point.
“Mothballing … does not mean the school is permanently closed,” he said. “It’s a temporary pause in enrollment that can be revoked at any time.”
The facility itself will remain available for community usage even if the building is mothballed, Harris added.
10 students
Previously, the board had agreed that they would mothball Jeffrey City Elementary if fewer than 10 students enrolled at the school by April 21, but during this month’s meeting, some trustees indicated that they would be open to revisiting the conversation if fewer students enrolled, too.
“Ten was not necessarily a set number,” Trustee Jared Kail said. “If we had less than that, I’m certain we would take a look.”
Currently, however, “we have zero,” Kail pointed out.
“We just don’t have any interest,” he said, encouraging local residents to reach out to the school district if they’re interested in enrolling at Jeffrey City Elementary.
“If people want to come and say … ‘We’ve got five kids that we want (to) go to school there,’ then fantastic – we’d love to open Jeffrey City,” he said. “But until we get that, there’s nothing we can do. We can’t run a school (with) zero kids. We can’t hire a teacher when we don’t have anyone to sign up. So spread the word. Tell all the folks that you know out in Jeffrey City – if you want your kids to enroll, now is the time. … Get kids registered, or we can’t move forward.”