WILLIAMSBURG–The Williamsburg City Council on Thursday, June 8 authorized a feasibility study to consider the possibility of running its own school district, independent of the one they now fund jointly with James City County.
“I hope for anybody (hearing about) this that they don’t see this as an indictment of the current education that is being provided to the children,” said Mayor Doug Pons. “We have an outstanding school system. There’s no criticism involved in this at all. This is just a study.”
Late Thursday afternoon, WJCC School Superintendent Olwen Herron sent a message to staff about the vote. “While I don’t typically send updates to you about actions taken by the elected officials of the localities, it is important to me that you receive this information directly from me because of the action’s connection to the school division,” Herron wrote. “What does this mean for WJCC Schools? At the moment, nothing. While we may wonder what the results of the study will be and what action, if any, will be taken, any commentary on those outcomes at this time would be speculative.”
Williamsburg residents make up about nine percent of the WJCC school system’s students.
City Manager Andrew Trivette emphasized that the idea for a study was driven by feedback from residents who expressed having more control and greater options over the educational opportunities for the city’s students, an idea that was included in the city’s 2023-2024 Goals, Initiatives, and Outcomes (GIO), adopted in November 2022. The GIO is heavily influenced by responses from residents to surveys the city conducted in 2022.
“One of the themes that came back was that the city needed to pay attention to innovation in the realm of public education, specifically asking us to consider new avenues for educating in a public school system, K through 12, with greater tie-ins to higher education and certificate outcomes,” Trivette said. “A lot of folks mentioned that we should rely on the assets we have right here on our front porch, including Colonial Williamsburg and William & Mary.”
The vote to approve the feasibility study was unanimous.
Trivette will now contract with a third-party consultant to lead the study, which will take place beginning this fall. The city will then offer multiple opportunities for public input based on the study’s findings.
Any implementation of recommendations from the study would take place, at the earliest, in the 2025-2026 school year. Williamsburg contracts every five years with James City County for school services and is currently in year two of the existing contract.
“(That) gives us about three years to consider alternatives and determine what steps we might want to take,” Trivette said. “Every time we renegotiate the contract the question comes up about what should our action be and we don’t always have all the answers. The purpose of this study is to give us some of those answers in a much more formal fashion than we have had in the past.”
The city will formally invite the William & Mary School of Education, and potentially other partners, to participate in the study.
“The message is clear,” Pons said. “We owe it to our citizenry to have this conversation.”
Stacy Kern-Scherer, the only council member with a child enrolled in Williamsburg/James City County Schools, agreed that getting more information was the right thing to do.
“Very simply it just makes good sense to study something that is important and what’s more important than public education?” she said.