Students and faculty will walk out of Sugarcreek Elementary School for the final time at the end of the 2022-2023 school year.

The Karns City Area School District school board passed a motion Monday to close the school June 20, 2023. The district plans to move all elementary students and faculty to Chicora Elementary School the following school year. District superintendent Eric Ritzert told the Eagle the board has been planning to consolidate elementary students for a few years, in part because of the building's age.

“It is in no way falling down, it is just smaller and our oldest facility,” Ritzert said. “It was built in the 1950s, had an addition in the early-1970s, but that has been the last of the significant updates.”

Ritzert said the district has also been planning an addition to Chicora Elementary School, so that it can hold all of its students. Now that the vote on Sugarcreek's closure is over, Ritzert said the board will begin talks on the addition project.

The addition is projected to be completed in summer 2023, allowing all elementary students to be in Chicora Elementary by the fall of that year, according to Ritzert.

Even though the decision to close Sugarcreek has been made, the district will maintain the facility until the transition is complete. Ritzert said the board may vote to sell the building in the coming years.

The district held a meeting in April for public comment on the closure of Sugarcreek, and a possible addition to Chicora Elementary. According to Ritzert, some common concerns about the projects include the future of Sugarcreek's staff and the students' actual transition from one school to the other.

The district closed Bruin Elementary School in 2011, so Ritzert said the board will likely follow procedures formed during that transition.

“We have prior experience in trying to balance the class sizes,” Ritzert said. “We think we would extend some options to parents about what they want to do these next few years.”