At the top of the school board meeting held on September 11, 2025, Superintendent Murphy shared remarks about the first days of school and how well things are going in our schools. He even held up a green bell pepper to highlight the Freedom Farm’s “poppin’” crops. “It is absolutely amazing,” he said.
Enrollment higher than projected.
Ultimately, the district is down 90 students from last year. But at the school level, there were some remarkable gains, or “better than projected” in specific areas.
While the report broke down enrollment by elementary and secondary, there was no analysis that compared cohorts as they moved up in grades. Is enrollment steady for, say, current 9th graders compared to when those students were in 6th grade? How might the district better understand their cohorts in addition to projecting overall enrollment?
One notable outlier was ORLA, which was 80 students below projection. A big part of that decline was in the Freedom Farm (new to ORLA’s building this year), which was forecasted at 75 students, but is reported at 39 students.
“I’m really excited. That’s my comment. This is awesome,” exclaimed Board President Clifthorne. “We are so enthusiastic about […] this project. And we couldn’t be happier to see more bell peppers in our boardroom.”
The word of the evening was FARM.
Superintendent Murphy, Executive Director Davis, Director Nielsen, and Executive Director Wilson presented a proposal to “increase budget authority in the capital project fund to develop the farm.”
The Freedom Farm, even though it is more than 50% under enrollment projections, will be receiving $4.5 million in interfund loans to finance infrastructure and building security costs for the program.
The money will come from interfund transfers from the Debt Service Fund, which is only supposed to pay down debt, so the money will be transferred to the Capital Project Fund. The district also pointed out that money from the Debt Service Fund cannot get transferred to the General Fund. The district raised this $4.5 million slowly over the last 12 years.
The presenters also noted that this work is supposed to be in partnership with the city, but the district wants to move quicker than the city is comfortable. There has been no formal agreement on sharing the costs. But Board Director Seidel was quick to applaud and thank the district’s “urgency” in developing this site. “Kids need classrooms,” Seidel said.
“I’m really excited. That’s my comment. This is awesome,” exclaimed Board President Clifthorne. “We are so enthusiastic about […] this project. And we couldn’t be happier to see more bell peppers in our boardroom.”
Back in black, baby.
The mood of the night was optimistic. If we were to summarize the district’s recent messages, it would be this, “We are above projections. We are doing so well, and we have so much confidence in the health of our district that we’re providing raises and developing more. Given the enrollment projections, and the fact that this district is starting to ready expansion for programs, clearly we are no longer in the situation where we need to discuss or even think about closing schools. It’s good to be back in black.”