Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) will open parent surveys and community input sessions on Monday, Oct. 19, launching feedback on potential school closures.

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High schools are not included.

Acting Chief Operations Officer Andrea Swiatocha outlined the engagement process at the Board of Education's Thursday, Oct. 8 meeting. She told the board no decisions have been made about which schools could close.

"There is no pre-list that has been developed," Swiatocha said, according to Bethesda Magazine. "We are at the very beginning of this process."

Two rounds of input

Round 1 runs Oct. 19 through Nov. 2 and includes four virtual sessions and six in-person evening meetings at middle schools around the county, according to the district's engagement site. Those sessions will focus on why changes are being considered, the student experience and the timeline ahead.

Round 2 is scheduled for Nov. 30 through Dec. 11 with the same format. December sessions will present findings from the first round and ask families to weigh in on the criteria used to evaluate schools.

Each in-person meeting will feature a brief presentation, information stations and staff available to answer questions, MoCo Show reported. Multilingual staff will be on hand. MCPS has also posted explanatory videos in eight languages on its website.

Specific session locations have not been published. Families can check mcpsstudy.org for the full schedule.

What comes next

Superintendent Thomas Taylor is scheduled to recommend specific closures and consolidations to the board on Feb. 4, 2027. Public hearings, one for each school recommended for closure, would follow from February through April. The board is set to vote April 15, 2027.

Any approved changes would not take effect until the 2029–2030 school year. A separate countywide boundary study is planned for the 2027–2028 school year.

Enrollment driving the process

Districtwide enrollment dropped from 165,267 students in 2019 to 156,050 in 2025, a decline of about 9,200 students, 7News reported. Unofficial district numbers show about 152,000 students enrolled for 2026–2027, roughly 3,000 below projections, according to Bethesda Magazine.

The district expects to lose another 7,500 students by 2031, according to school board documents cited by Bethesda Magazine.

Kim Francisco, an MCPS parent of two elementary school students, told 7News after the Oct. 8 meeting that keeping up with the pace of changes has felt like whiplash. The Walt Whitman High School PTSA in Bethesda shared the district's closure-study update on Oct. 9.

Families can register for sessions and find details at mcpsstudy.org.