Since 2007, over 650 public schools have closed in Puerto Rico, representing nearly 44% of all public schools on the archipelago (Yedidia et al. 2020). In the aftermath of closures, hundreds of now-vacant school buildings signify a void where vibrant education centers once stood and present a politicized regional development dilemma for how these abandoned properties will be repurposed, if at all. Mass school closures have become increasingly commonplace. From 2004 to 2017, over 23,000 schools were closed throughout the US, displacing an average of over 250,000 students annually (Delpier 2021).

Shuttered schools can have widespread and lingering consequences, often falling disproportionately on marginalized communities (Delpier 2021). Schools not only serve as institutions for education and learning but also offer community resources to meet social, recreational, health, and personal needs (Lytton 2011). Thus, schools function as community anchors and hubs for educating and employing residents, especially in rural areas, and provide a distinct community identity and sense of place (Kearns et al. 2009; Rosenbaum et al. 2019; Witten et al. 2001).

Recent studies have investigated school closures and their consequences, focusing on decision-making criteria for closures, their economic ramifications, and racial inequity and opposition (Brazil and Candipan 2022; Tieken and Auldridge-Reveles 2019). Less attention has been given to how abandoned schools are managed and priorities for their post-closure use. Because school buildings hold emotional and material value, and their reuse can significantly buffer the loss of a community resource, decisions on how to repurpose them present complex challenges and are often politicized. Few school districts have formalized procedures to collect and consider resident input to decide on school repurposing plans or have the capacity to navigate market challenges along with state and local policies (Dowdall and Warner 2013). In rare circumstances where school districts involve residents in the decision-making process, they tend to be consulted on proposed plans, which misses opportunities to explore and support community visions to repurpose schools in ways that minimize the damage of closures.

2. School Closures and Their Consequences

School closures have been a disruptive phenomenon for hundreds of communities across the United States. School districts are experiencing aging school facilities, increasing budget constraints, and pressure to improve education spending efficiency, coupled with enrollment decline due to demographic shifts and competition with charter schools (Barber 2018). Mass closures have been linked to political–economic shifts and institutional reforms grounded in neoliberal agendas (Basu 2007). Public schools are prime targets for urban and regional renewal strategies that foster the rationalization of public assets and the divestment of public-sector support in favor of entrepreneurial and private market investment (Lynch 2022). School closures have also been described as a means to attract higher-income residents and private investment into disadvantaged neighborhoods by closing underperforming schools and increasing school choice options (Bierbaum 2021b; Davis and Oakley 2013). Unsurprisingly, school closures engender controversy. City officials have justified school closures as a benevolent policy that will improve cost efficiency and educational quality while aspiring to address the inequality of disadvantaged students and residents (Davis and Oakley 2013; Tieken and Auldridge-Reveles 2019). School closure decisions are typically grounded in two criteria: academic performance and school enrollment (Tieken and Auldridge-Reveles 2019). These criteria are used to frame school closures as opportunities to provide better educational opportunities to marginalized communities, whether that involves transferring students to larger schools with more facilities and better educational experiences or consolidating schools to integrate and equalize Black and White student experiences. In contrast, parents, students, and community members tend to view school closures as discriminatory and harmful, especially Black and Latino populations who absorb the majority of closures (Nuamah 2020), leading to staged protests, hunger strikes, lawsuits, and other forms of resistance to save their schools (Brazil 2020; Tieken and Auldridge-Reveles 2019). The prevailing decision-making criteria have led to school closures occurring disproportionately in socio-economically disadvantaged and minority neighborhoods, creating new modes of community disposability (McWilliams and Kitzmiller 2019). Lower-resourced neighborhoods are more likely to have lower-resourced and lower-performing schools than more affluent areas (Owens and Candipan 2019). In addition, declining student enrollment is often driven by the “White flight” out of public schools resulting from school district desegregation, the increase in private schools, and the general out-migration into suburban neighborhoods (Zhang and Ruther 2020). Schools are a unique and often undervalued publicly funded societal infrastructure. Beyond a place for education, many communities rely on schools to house health clinics, daycare centers, after-school social programs, and recreation spaces, among other activities. Public schools serve as a “third place”—that is, a place other than work or home where people meet to build relationships and supportive networks (Rosenbaum et al. 2019). The loss of a school can deteriorate a sense of community identity (Witten et al. 2001). Schools are referred to as storehouses of history and cultural pillars for their role in educating and employing residents and bringing people together. They hold a special intrinsic value since generations of residents spent their formative years in these institutions, creating notions of communal ownership (Cranston 2017; Ewing 2018; Kearns et al. 2009). School closures cause neighborhoods to become less attractive to families and, in more rural areas, can even threaten the economic viability of the entire community (Cranston 2017; People for Education 2009). Left abandoned, schools present a potential hazard. Vacant buildings decrease property values, invite vandalism, discourage investments, impose financial costs on municipalities, and generally lower residents’ quality of life (Cohen 2001). While investments in school facilities, under the right conditions, can catalyze community development in myriad ways, discussions to improve schools and communities have remained largely in the hands of scholars, practitioners, and policymakers (Bierbaum et al. 2023; Good 2022).

3. Adaptive Reuse of Abandoned School Buildings

An emerging literature has explored how various entities are adaptively reusing school buildings to breathe new life into communities. Adaptive reuse refers to the process of reusing an existing building for a different purpose than it was originally designed for and can help conserve social, cultural, and historical values held by community residents, providing a psychological and sociological sense of stability (Bullen and Love 2011). For some, repurposing schools is a form of “restorative nostalgia” that reconstructs the past in new ways (Boym 2008). Because community members often want school buildings repurposed for public use, proposed commercial use can be divisive (Dowdall and Warner 2013). The adaptive reuse literature describes an ideal project as one that protects the values and character that the community attaches to the building, maintains its social and historic fabric, and replaces the anchoring element lost with the school’s closure (Hamilton 2013; Mısırlısoy and Günçe 2016). As mass school closures have increased across the US (Dowdall and Warner 2013), school districts must grapple with what to do with their vacant buildings. School properties have become key sites of contestation in the politics of place and community change (Bierbaum 2021a). School closures, sales, and reuse can effectively erase communities’ multigenerational schooling experiences (Khalifa et al. 2014) and reinforce social suffering in public schools and neighborhoods (Dumas 2014). These experiences extend beyond the walls of the school building to the broader neighborhood and demonstrate how maintaining linkages to the past is critical to making sense of the future (Bierbaum 2021b). Repurposing schools tends to attract less attention and passion than closing them in the first place, but the process takes considerable effort from government authorities, and the outcomes can significantly impact the surrounding community. Finding new owners to repurpose closed schools entails navigating market challenges, adhering to state and local policies, and balancing sometimes conflicting priorities on how to best use the property. Government authorities expecting significant sums for school properties are often disappointed, as sale prices are typically between USD 200,000 and USD 1 million, well below initial projections (Dowdall 2015). The low sale prices are attributed to poor building conditions, inflexible layouts for repurposing, and locations in residential areas with decreasing populations. Even when schools have been resold, there is no guarantee they will successfully be reused since many aspects of the re-development process, such as repairs, zoning approvals, financing, and community concerns, can all delay or derail a project (Dowdall 2015). Few districts have formalized procedures to collect and consider resident input to decide how to repurpose schools (Anderson 2015); only 1 out of the 12 school districts studied by The Pew Charitable Trusts had a formal guideline for repurposing closed schools (Dowdall and Warner 2013). Over time, abandoned school buildings deteriorate, making them even harder to resell and increasing the likelihood that they become blighted properties. Because shuttered schools invoke a stronger sense of community ownership and passionate opinions than other vacant buildings, repurposing schools in ways that do not align with residents’ vision for their community can confront significant opposition. Several studies have highlighted positive examples of how school districts have included community input within the reuse decision-making processes. For example, in Atlanta, the school district convened a “repurposing committee” comprised of school and city officials along with community representatives who vote on potential lessees’ or buyers’ plans to purchase and repurpose the school property. In Kansas City, the district promotes public engagement with prospective developers by organizing site tours, public meetings, and other efforts to ensure community interactions. Philadelphia’s reuse policy requires bids to be reviewed by an evaluation team composed of members of the school district, city planning commission, and affected civic groups (Dowdall and Warner 2013). While these forms of community consultation productively incorporate community feedback, they can also be interpreted as a strategy to limit disruptions to developer’s school repurposing plans and may overlook opportunities to support community visions for how adaptive reuse of closed schools can best meet local needs.