A new school year is here. What can students, parents expect?

Hundreds of thousands of students will finish their summer breaks and head to classrooms on Monday as the 2026-27 school year begins in the Clark County School District. The nation’s fifth‑largest school district is entering 2026-27 with roughly 99 percent of staff positions filled, the smallest vacancy rate in years, according to district data shared Friday. Only 170 classroom teacher vacancies remained as of Wednesday. The district said it expects some vacancies at the outset of the school year. **School facilities plan on track** With its listening tour complete, district leaders are poised to present a multibillion‑dollar Facility Master Plan to the Clark County School Board this fall. The plan could dramatically reshape school buildings across the valley over the next decade, proposing new pre‑K through eighth‑grade campuses and the closure and rezoning of certain elementary and middle schools. School closures are listed as an option only when students could be rezoned to a higher‑quality facility, said Brandon McLaughlin, the district’s chief of facilities, in an earlier interview with the Las Vegas Review‑Journal. “*If I’m a pupil and I’m astatine a truly horrible schoolhouse — the AC goes retired intermittently, the lights aren’t reliable — I would hatred to person to question further to spell to conscionable arsenic atrocious of a school,*” McLaughlin said earlier this year. “*We’re not looking astatine immoderate schoolhouse consolidations oregon closures wherever students spell to worse solutions.*” The School Board will have the final opportunity this autumn to decide whether the plan’s proposals become reality. **How will enrollment fare?** The district tallied 291,587 students last school year, the fewest since the 2005-06 term, according to Nevada Department of Education data. Enrollment decline is expected to continue this year, creating a ripple effect on school budgets because pupil numbers directly drive state funding. Projections estimate a loss of 25,000 students over the next five years, said Rick Baldwin, the district’s manager of long‑range planning, earlier this year. A decline of that size could shrink the district’s budget by roughly a quarter‑billion dollars if the per‑pupil funding level set by the state remains unchanged. Official student counts will not be finalized until early fall, but those figures will have an immediate impact on budgets. **Academic gains** State data slated for release early this fall will show whether academic improvements persisted in 2025-26, Superintendent Jhone Ebert’s first full year in the top role. Students across all grade levels made modest gains in mathematics and English Language Arts during the 2024-25 school year, yet more than half of all students remained non‑proficient in those two core subjects, and Clark County schools stayed 2 to 4 points below pre‑pandemic proficiency levels at nearly every grade. The district is launching the first year of a new five‑year strategic plan aimed at boosting student outcomes. The plan targets a 60 percent increase in K‑3 literacy rates and a 50 percent rise in grades 3‑8 mathematics and literacy rates by 2031. In 2024-25, mathematics proficiency for grades 3‑8 stood at 33 percent and literacy at 43.9 percent, per Nevada Department of Education figures. “*This program is perfectly achievable by each of america moving unneurotic and being transparent connected wherever we’re at,*” Ebert said of the strategic plan in May. **School traffic safety information improvements** A range of traffic safety ideas discussed by a district working group may appear on roads and in classrooms this school year after a particularly hazardous year for student pedestrians. Vehicles struck 427 students last school year, a 356 percent increase in collisions from the prior year. Four of those students died from the injuries. The School Traffic Safety Working Group produced 75 recommendations to reduce crashes. Nineteen are classified as short‑term actions that could be completed within the next two years, including providing families with maps of safe walking or biking routes, increasing law‑enforcement presence near schools during pick‑up and drop‑off periods, and installing upgraded signage at frequently used crosswalks. Several municipalities and community partners have joined the district’s effort to improve school zone safety, and this year will reveal whether these new strategies make a dent in the number of student‑pedestrian collisions. **Upcoming legislative session** District officials and Clark County Education Association leaders are already preparing for the 2027 Nevada Legislature, which convenes in February. Specific policy priorities are still being shaped, but a new pilot program highlighted areas where both the district and the union will seek legislative action. Those include extending school days, expanding full‑day pre‑K, offering targeted literacy and math tutoring, and implementing teacher‑development strategies currently being tested in 18 struggling schools. “*Our extremity is to amusement advancement and that children are achieving, and yet instrumentality this accusation to bring that up to the legislative league to amusement these are the gains we’re making, and this is however we request to unafraid much backing to amended this and truly grow it crossed the district,*” Kristan Nigro, the union’s president, told the Review‑Journal on Thursday. Although the district will finalize its legislative platform in December, trustees have already identified several priorities for the upcoming session, including funding for special education, pre‑K, and restrictions on open‑enrollment students, among other items.