Rural Vermont schools face district mergers and closures as student populations dip and per-pupil costs climb

Third and fourth grade students at Peacham Elementary School, in Peacham, Vt. The school has 60 students and is tucked in a rural northeastern part of the state. (Photo by Oliver Parini, The Hechinger Report) 

Over the past 20 years, smaller schools in Vermont have grappled with shrinking student enrollment, rising per-pupil costs, and property tax hikes. As the country's most rural state, Vermont's educational challenges are being "closely watched by rural education advocates nationwide," reports Chris Berdik of The Hechinger Report. Vermont's educational struggles mirror that of many American rural school districts. 

Across Vermont, public schools have lost 20% of their student population. That kind of steep decline has an outsized impact on rural school budgets, which must juggle increasing per-pupil costs, rising health care costs for teacher benefits and spending limited by a smaller property tax base.

Vermont lawmakers have passed a series of district consolidations to cut costs and offer students more services. "In 2015, Act 46 triggered several years of mergers — first voluntary, then required — that eliminated dozens of districts and led many small schools to close," Berdik explains.

In July, the Vermont legislature passed Act 73, which mandates "a minimum of 4,000 students per district, a threshold now met by only 1 of the state’s 119 districts," Berdick writes. The extreme educational changes Act 73 would require "ignited intense pushback from people fearing the loss of local control over education, even from a majority of the task force created to map options for bigger districts."

Supporters for consolidation "maintain that the crises of declining enrollment, falling test scores and tight education budgets demand a bold response," Berdik reports. Opponents want "any mergers and closings to be voluntary and done with a clear-eyed accounting of what’s to be gained and lost."

Vermont lawmakers will decide this month whether to proceed with Act 73 or dial back the proces to leave time and space to retool their plans.

What's for lunch? This year's school lunches include restrictions that challenge cafeterias and budgets

'Woodles' are a versatile school lunch favorite.

Estimates on how many rural children rely on school lunches for at least one nutritionally balanced meal to fill their bellies each weekday hover around five million. Nationwide, school cafeterias in America "serve 45 million meals a day," reports Kim Severson of The New York Times. "If they were a restaurant chain, it would be the largest in the country."

Besides the sheer number of meals that need to be served, school cafeteria planners and workers are managing "tighter nutritional standards, and limits on food purchased from other countries, like bananas, to 10% of what’s served," Severson explains. "School nutrition directors are bracing for the impact of federal budget cuts and updated federal dietary guidelines."

Some schools have already implemented some of the new guidelines, which include less sugar, fewer food dyes and more scratch-made entrees. But upgrading lunches while reducing costs will be tough on school cafeteria budgets. Severson adds, "And then there is the biggest challenge of all: How to satisfy the fast-changing tastes of a generation of food-savvy children."

Severson outlines what's new on the menu for 2025-26 school meals; a few are shared below.

• Sugar reduction and "cultural-club" food: Lunch favorites such as yogurt, milk and cereal are limited by grams of sugar. "A cup of chocolate milk, for example, can have only 10 grams or less of added sugar," Severson writes. Schools can opt to use "more culturally inclusive [ingredients], or swap out meat with legumes, tofu and other alternative protein sources."
• Make it from scratch, like they did before the 1980s, which saves money and is generally healthier. "Cooking from scratch is one way to make school food healthier," Severson reports. "More districts are trying to bring it back after economic pressures and looser federal standards in the 1980s resulted in an era of heat-and-eat meals."
• Bring on the noodles and 'Woodles': "Woodles are the most exciting new thing to hit the cafeteria this year," Severson explains. "The dried ramen noodles, made by a South Carolina company, were created specifically for school food service, with enough whole wheat to satisfy federal nutrition requirements."