USD 232 in De Soto will quadruple its capacity for open enrollment in the 2025-26 school year, allowing more students who live outside the school district’s boundaries to attend there this fall.
On Monday, the USD 232 Board of Education approved 7-0 the recommendation by district officials to increase the district’s capacity from 34 open seats to 138.
Slots won’t be open at every school. Instead, they will be available for out-of-district students at select campuses in the district covering all grade levels, including Horizon Elementary, Monticello Trails Middle School and De Soto High School.
The increase in available seats comes after two years of declining attendance in the school district, especially in kindergarten, district leaders said.
“When you look at the (2023-24) school year to (2024-25), which is the current school year, we were down about 73 students,” said Alvie Cater, the district’s deputy chief of staff and communications. “Then, when you look at the 22-23 school year to the 23-24 school year, we were down about the same amount, in the 80s.”
The expansion of available open seats comes after the first year that Kansas schools implemented provisions of a sweeping education law — passed by the Kansas Legislature in 2022 and signed by Gov. Laura Kelly — that, among other things, requires public schools in the state to allow for the enrollment of students who live outside district boundaries, provided there is available space.
Districts’ capacity limits are determined by a number of factors, including current student-teacher ratios, expected future enrollment, demand for certain courses and school buildings’ maximum capacities.
USD 232 had more available seats this year
There were worries that an influx of open enrollment applications would flood local public school districts.
In the 2024-25 school year, however, USD 232 received 11 applications and accepted five out-of-district transfers.
USD 232’s enrollment plan for nonresident students for next school year determined it will have 138 available seats.
Those open seats will be apportioned across seven schools:
- Belmont Elementary — Four open seats in first grade, two in second grade and three in fourth grade
- Clear Creek Elementary — Four in fourth grade and five in fifth grade
- Horizon Elementary — 10 in kindergarten, five in first grade, five in second grade, five in third grade, four in fourth grade and six in fifth grade
- Prairie Ridge Elementary — Five in kindergarten
- Riverview Elementary — Four in fourth grade and four in fifth grade
- Starside Elementary — Two in kindergarten
- Monticello Trails Middle — 10 in sixth grade and 10 in seventh grade
- De Soto High — 10 in ninth grade, 20 in 10th grade, 10 in 11th grade and 10 in 12th grade
Nonresident students must still qualify for enrollment
Nonresident students applying to USD 232 must still meet certain criteria to be enrolled.
Most notably, nonresident students in either district will have to maintain a 90% attendance rate and cannot have more than three out-of-school suspensions in order to stay enrolled. They also cannot be currently under suspension or expulsion from another school district.
In one case during the 2024-25 open enrollment period, one student was not accepted by USD 232 because they weren’t in good standing with their home district, Cater said.
“There was one student that we determined not to be in good standing and informed that family because (they had) very poor attendance at the previous school,” he said during the meeting.
Some nonresident students will also have priority when applying to USD 232, including children of district employees, students experiencing homelessness, military students and siblings of students enrolled in the districts.
The enrollment window opened in January
Last year, USD 232’s open enrollment window was open from June 1 to June 30.
This year’s window opened on Jan. 1, after the Kansas Legislature modified the open enrollment law, and it will close on June 15.
Since it opened, Cater said the district has already received a number of applications, though he does not expect them to fill all the available seats.
“I do not believe we’re going to get 138 applications for nonresident enrollment because if you look at it for this current school year, we identified 34 seats and and I think we ended up with five,” he said.
In the coming years, with big additions to the area, like the Panasonic plant in De Soto opening, those numbers could change.
“As single-family and multi-family units come online, we do anticipate some increase in student enrollment, but not significantly, at least in the next year or two,” he said.
