Arlington Public Schools opens the 2025-26 school year with a 99.3% staffing rate, one of the highest in recent memory.
Only 34 staff positions out of more than 3,000 positions are unfilled, Superintendent Francisco Durán told School Board members on Aug. 21.
“It’s the most filled we’ve been in quite some time,” Durán said. “We are looking forward to having all [remaining] 34 filled.”
More than 200 new teachers and staff were on hand as the school year began on Monday (Aug. 25). Durán said that about 70% of new teachers were not new to the profession, but relocating from elsewhere.
He said educators were drawn to “the values that we have here.”
Mary Kadera, who at four years of seniority currently is the longest serving School Board member, praised efforts to get the staff-vacancy rates down to a manageable level.
Four years ago, “we were at a hundred-plus” vacancies at the start of school, she said.
Kadera noted the school system’s “grow your own” programs, which take current students and instructional-assistant personnel and provide pathways to eventual teacher licensure.
Boundary changes off the table for 2026-27 school year: In what likely will come as a relief across the board, county schools staff proposed no changes to elementary-school and middle-school boundaries next year.
“No one wants to do boundary changes” if they can be avoided, said Superintendent Francisco Durán, who on Aug. 21 formally recommended against them for the coming school year.
Arlington Public Schools’ facility personnel told School Board members that none of the elementary or middle schools is expected to be over capacity in the next five years.
And while several schools are projected to be under capacity by more than 15%, staff told Board members the disruption caused by boundary adjustments outweighs any benefits they might have.
Board members accepted the recommendation, and will revisit the numbers in two years.
“I can see the logic behind that,” Board Chair Bethany Zecher Sutton said of deferring any action.
At the same meeting, Board members said they wanted to take more time to consider other potentially contentious boundary issues, including future locations of countywide “options” schools and the possible consolidation of elementary schools due to flat enrollment.
“It’s easier to do that when we’re not in the thick of the boundary process. We need to do those in a period of relative calm,” Board member Mary Kadera said in pushing for more discussion.
Boundary adjustments for high schools were last made in the 2022-23 school year and were not scheduled for consideration this year.
“High schools have been delayed because of the opening [in 2026-27] of the Grace Hopper Center,” Durán said. “We will look in two years at that.”
