Miami-Dade County closing nine schools amid enrollment drops

• Members of the Miami-Dade County School Board voted to close nine schools during a June 17 meeting.
• Some of the institutions will be consolidated with others nearby.
• The closures and consolidations come amid declining enrollment.

Members of the Miami-Dade County School Board voted to close nine schools in the area during a June 17 meeting. Some of the institutions will be consolidated with others nearby.

The schools to be shuttered and/or merged include:

• Mandarin Lakes K-8 Academy, which will close.
• Robert Russa Moton Elementary, which will close.
• Parkway Elementary, which will close.
• Rainbow Park Elementary, which will close.
• Phillis Wheatley Elementary, which will close.
• Lenora B. Smith Elementary school, which will be combined with Georgia Jones-Ayers Middle, becoming a K-8 center.
• Miami Springs Middle, which will be combined with Miami Springs Senior to become a 6-12 school.
• Pine Villa Elementary School, which will be combined with Arthur & Polly Mays Conservatory of the Arts in order to form a K-12 school.
• Richmond Heights Middle, which will be combined with BioTech at Richmond Heights 9-12 to form a 6-12 school.

Though most campuses of the merging schools neighbor one another, Miami Springs Middle and Miami Springs High are located around a mile and a half apart.

"These schools serve some of the highest-poverty communities in Miami-Dade," said Lissette Fernandez, co-founder of Moms for Libros, during the meeting.

"The state has underfunded public schools to the point where this district is closing the schools that serve children who have the least," she continued.

The closures and consolidations come amid declining student enrollment — the Miami-Dade County School District had 313,220 students enrolled at the start of the 2025-2026 school year, down around 13,000 from the start of the 2024-25 school year. It’s a dip that WLRN previously reported has been frequently attributed to Florida’s expanded voucher program, which allowed for the rapid growth of charter and private schools. Miami-Dade County officials, however, said the drop is partially due to fewer immigrant families moving to South Florida.

Drops in student enrollment

The five largest school districts in Florida by enrollment, including Miami-Dade and Broward, have collectively lost about 67,000 non-charter students from the 2023-2024 school year through the 2025-2026 school year.

That’s according to figures compiled by the Lee County school district, provided in May as part of a discussion surrounding its “budget realignment.” The numbers are as of February 2026, and refer to total membership for grades from PreK-12.

From 2023-2024 to 2024-2025, Miami-Dade Public Schools lost 6,947 non-charter students and gained 1,331 charter students. From 2024-2025 to 2025-2026, the district lost 15,288 non-charter students and gained 428 charter students. In February, the district had 232,617 non-charter students enrolled for the 2025-2026 year, along with 86,802 charter students.

In Broward, meanwhile, the district lost 9,512 non-charter students from 2023-2024 to 2024-2025 and gained 68 charter school students. From 2024-2025 to 2025-2026, the district lost 6,955 non-charter students and 1,328 charter students. The district had 185,864 non-charter students enrolled at the start of the 2025-2026 year, as well as 48,460 charter students.

Collectively, the Broward and Miami-Dade school districts lost 38,702 non-charter students from 2023-2024 through 2025-2026.

Broward County is also considering more than 10 school closures for 2027-2028 academic year

At a May 12 school board workshop, Superintendent Dr. Howard Hepburn said the Broward School District could close more than 10 schools in the 2027-2028 academic year in response to a question by board member Dr. Allen Zeman.

“If what we are trying to do is to create the most efficient and effective school district possible, what, in general, would be the number of schools you'd look to repurpose through this cycle?” Zeman asked.

Closures are part of an ongoing effort to shutter, amalgamate or repurpose campuses throughout the district in response to a precipitous decline in enrollment.

“You always got the hard questions, huh, Doc?” Hepburn said, adding, “I don’t want to scare the public, but I would say definitely above 10.”

No specific schools were mentioned. In January, the Broward County School Board decided to close seven public schools, which Hepburn called one of several “cost saving measures,” essential for a district that he said had lost over 40,000 students in the past 10 years, or over $30 million in revenue.

(This story was updated to add new information.)

Sarah Perkel is a South Florida Connect Reporter for the USA TODAY Network's Florida Connect team. You can get all of Florida’s best content directly in your inbox each weekday day by signing up for the free newsletter, Florida TODAY.