DUBLIN (KRON) — Overcrowding is a significant problem for students at Dublin High School.
In fact, schools throughout the district are seeing a big jump in enrollment.
School officials tell KRON the answer is building new schools.
Students and staff said they are noticing the overcrowding.
“In the 12 years that I have been here, we have doubled in size,” Principal Maureen Byrne said.
That is because Dublin is one of the fastest-growing cities in the State of California. There were 14,000 residents there in 1982.
Now, there is over 53,000 people living there and only one high school in town.
“And we are poising to increase exponentially (next year) as well, from last year to this year, we have increased about 200 students,” Byrne said. “We are at 2,500. Next year, we will probably be at 27 (hundred), and we will keep going from there.”
Even with the collegiate style campus and fewer enclosed buildings than a typical high school, students said they can definitely feel the presence of the additional classmates.
With that growth comes big plans for building new schools throughout the district, Dublin Unified School District spokeswoman Michelle McDonald said.
“We have one school in the pipeline, a K-8 school that will come online in fall of 2018,” McDonald said. “We have a plan to build a second high school here in Dublin, and we probably have to put up another couple of schools in the next 10 years or so.”
In the meantime, parents said a little overcrowding doesn’t take away from their kids attending one of the top performing schools in Alameda County.
“We’re adjusting, it’s so worth it,” parent Kalini Boykin said. “The quality of education, the staff that’s here, the curriculum. It’s a great environment for the children”