Wooster School in Danbury to Phase Out Lower School

DANBURY, CT — Wooster School has announced that it would be phasing out its Lower School program over the next two years due to low enrollment, citing regional and national trends as contributing factors.

"While we have seen record enrollment growth in our Upper School program, which is up over 50 percent in the last five years, we have been unable to maintain healthy enrollment numbers in our Lower School," said Head of School Matt Byrnes in a release.

Among the trends cited by Byrnes are a steadily declining birthrate over the last ten years and the rising cost of college.

"By all accounts, these economic and demographic realities aren't going to change in coming decades, and will continue to threaten the educational and financial viability of lower school divisions in independent schools," Byrnes said.

Byrnes noted that there remains keen interest in the school's program for grades five through twelve.

Wooster Board of Trustees President Leon Weaver echoed Byrnes' comments, adding that a special committee of the Board and school administrators had spent two years studying all aspects of the situation. "In the end, the facts were irrefutable: although we have a first-rate product in the Lower School program, the market doesn't exist to sustain the kind of educational experience our families rely on, nor provide the financial stability it is our job as trustees to ensure. Due to a number of demographic factors, these circumstances are unlikely to change in the foreseeable future."

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Wooster School will continue to offer its lower school program for students in grades three through five in 2019-2020, and fourth and fifth grade options in 2020-21, before settling in to a fifth through twelfth grade program in 2021-2022 and beyond.

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