Students at Akron Public Schools will no longer be in class during May’s primary election, following a vote by school board members to make Election Day a professional development day.
The move comes after Rene Molenaur, a member of Akron’s Board of Education, expressed concern this spring about the fact that in order to cast ballots at Resnik Community Learning Center, voters had to go through areas where they might cross paths with students. Molenaur called it a safety concern.
Nothing changed before the May 6 primary, but school board members on Monday decided to swap a March 27, 2026, professional development day with next year’s May 5 primary, so students will not be at school when voters arrive.
On Monday, Molenaur told fellow school board members that parents who had read the board agenda over the weekend thanked her in advance for the board’s intention to make the change. She said she was excited that the issue was recognized.
With vote, students won’t see parents come to school to cast ballots
But clearing the way for voters at Resnik and other schools means children will not have the experience of watching people contribute to democracy, said Board Member Barbara Sykes — something she thinks is disappointing. Sykes voted in favor of the proposal but said she was torn. It passed 6-0; Board Member Gregory Harrison was absent.
“I’m a little saddened children may not have that opportunity to see their parents come to vote, see their neighbors come to vote,” Sykes said. “This is the fundamental of our democracy.”
Superintendent Mary Outley said the move to a professional development day could encourage adults to take children with them to vote — as she had done with her niece — because they won’t be in school. Outley said she agreed that it was good to see the democratic process in action.
Board members want more students to be interested in participating in democracy
School Board President Carla Jackson said she’d been asked repeatedly about whether civics were still being taught in school. Jackson, who’s been registering people to vote through church and sorority groups, said she was disappointed by the number of people who were neither registered nor interested in becoming voters.
Sykes said she hoped the school board could monitor the decision to see what happened, and perhaps reverse it in the future. She wants students to understand the purpose of Election Day, so when they’re old enough, they want to register and participate.
“This is voting day,” Sykes said. “It’s a very exciting thing.”
School construction projects moving forward
School board members also voted to approve a contract for Hasenstab Architects, Inc./Moody Nolan to serve as the architectural design firm for the North High School project. Board members first agreed to negotiate with the architects to finalize a contract in May.
The details of the contract were not available Monday.
Steve Thompson, the APS treasurer and chief financial officer, said construction costs were escalating at a rate of 16% annually. Voters last fall agreed to fund an $85 million bond to build a new North High School, but Thompson said his estimate for the project is now $105 million.
Because the $85 million bond was approved, Thompson said there will not be any delays in beginning the project, though a construction manager at risk still must be hired to manage the day-to-day. He said the district has options to fill future funding gaps.
Namely, those are a certificate of participation — a loan based on the building itself, and the mechanism the district is using to pay for the combined Miller South School for the Visual and Performing Arts and Pfeiffer Elementary — and a tax anticipation note, which is a loan on future levy dollars.
Thompson said the district intends to ask the City of Akron to use all of the money left in the Local Fund Initiative pot, which was used to build the district’s community learning centers, to cover gaps in the Miller South/Pfeiffer funding. That fund has about $18 million in it, but not all of it is available to spend on construction.
The next joint meeting between the city and the school board is on Friday, Thompson said, and more details should be available then about what funds are actually available.
