With the Springfield City School District announcing the soon-to-be closure of the School of Innovation (SOI) at the end of the 2025-26 year, many students, families and community members are expressing their concerns and how it will affect them.
District leaders said the SOI will consolidate with Springfield High School at the beginning of the 2026-27 school year, and the 100 impacted students will transition to the high school as well — a decision that was made because of the growing budget constraints related to state funding.
Superintendent Bob Hill told the News-Sun the closure is a “direct response” to declining enrollment patterns and rising operational costs.
“Maintaining a small, standalone school while the district confronts growing obligations in several areas is not financially sustainable,” he said. “Students will transition into settings that provide stronger access to staff, services and comprehensive programming. This is a responsible realignment, not a reduction in educational opportunity.”
The SOI gives a second option for high school students in the district to focus on project-based learning instead of traditional classroom instruction. It has normal classes and all of the core areas, but it also has hands-on programs for students to get experience to go out in the community and work.
‘I would not be where I am today at all’
For Omaria Ali, SOI has been a part of her story, healing and personal journey. She chose to go to SOI because of the smaller, hands-on environment where “everybody knows everybody.”
“I just felt like it would be way better for me rather than going to Springfield High and being with thousands of kids and hundreds of teachers, and I just couldn’t imagine how I would be, how things would be different if I went to Springfield. I would not be where I am today at all,” she said.
Omaria Ali is a junior who went to SOI her first two years of high school before transferring to the Springfield-Clark Career Technology Center (CTC). After this semester, she wanted to transfer back to SOI for her last semester since she is still close with everyone there and it’s “her home” and “where her support is.”
When speaking about her journey, Omaria Ali talked about a time when she was a sophomore in March of this year and was “shot point blank range” while with a friend picking up food. When it first happened, she said staff members Andrea Whitacre and Beth Dixon bought her gift baskets and had everyone sign a card with nice notes for her.
“After that, I lost any desire for anything...But this school, no one let me give up, and even though I wanted to so bad, nobody let me,” she said. “I know that as long as I have this school, that I will never be failing anything.”
Taking advantage of a smaller learning environment
Omaria Ali’s concern is the kids, who feel safe in the smaller learning environment, will be transferred to the high school, which is a bigger building with more kids. She said they won’t get the same one-on-one experience, teachers or project-based learning and hands-on environment.
“The type of kids that go to SOI need this environment, and I don’t think that Springfield (High) would benefit them (the same way),” she said.
If SOI closes, Ali said she’s is going to try to take College Credit Plus classes and graduate early.
Olana Ali, Omaria Ali’s sister, is in eighth grade and was planning to go to the SOI next year because of the smaller environment.
“I’ve been looking forward to it because the smaller environment felt like somewhere I could actually be comfortable,” she said. “I have social anxiety, so big schools feel overwhelming for me. This school felt like a place where I could fit in, get the support I need and not feel lost in a big crowd.”
Olana Ali said she already felt connected to the people at SOI because of her sister and how much they helped her.
“It made me feel like I’d be walking into a community that cared almost like family. Losing that option makes me nervous about having to go to a bigger, more stressful school where I might not get the same personal attention or sense of safety,” she said.
‘A school that’s worth fighting for’
Hannah Mills, also a junior at CTC who went to SOI her first two years, said the school cares enough about the students to make sure they feel comfortable in all situations.
“If you’re putting kids in school, you want them to be comfortable with the environment that they’re in. We know SOI works, we know it thrives as a school,” Mills said.
The school might only have a population of about 100 students, but Mills said their school was worth preserving for those students.
“SOI is a school that’s worth fighting for because that school shows the environment that we learn in, that the teachers provide us with and the staff provide us with is what works,” Mills said.
Mills’ concerns about the closure is also the transition to the high school and there not being another option for students.
“I feel irritated and agitated and extremely unheard and want to speak up about everything about this because it’s not being taken into consideration,” she said.
District leaders recently brought eighth graders to tour the SOI and renovated the new library that hasn’t even been open a year, said Mills, who questions why the district would do that if they were going to close the school down.
She said she thinks the school is being cut because of the low population, even though it’s meant to be that way, Mills said, since their academics “thrive” and there is a waitlist.
“They’re choosing to cut our school, and it confuses me,” she said. “They’re shutting down the one spot that we do have that has a little bit of hope that could be the future.”
Mills’ sister is a sophomore at SOI who is “thriving,” but will have to move to the high school where “in the first place never (wanted) to go because it’s too big for her and she knows she doesn’t thrive in environments that are big (because of her social anxiety),” Mills said.
‘Change is not always easy’
When sophomore Alyssa Picolo and her friends were told about the closure, she said people started “crying and panicking because we’re just kids.”
“We didn’t get to decide if the one place we felt safe in stayed open. The one place where we weren’t scared of somebody having a weapon. The one place that listened to us unlike every other school, and the people we trust leave us because they also didn’t get to choose what was happening in the very place they work,” she said.
Sophomore Vivian Garringer said the SOI changed her life and helped her develop into a stronger person.
When she was at Hayward Middle School, she struggled with panic attacks, was hospitalized multiple times because of mental health issues and spent three months in a partial hospitalized program while doing schoolwork online because she “couldn’t physically handle the bustling school environment.”
But since being at SOI, she has only suffered one panic attack and been hospitalized once, received the Business Advisory Award of Excellence for academics, and has taken honors classes and achieved high marks.
“I just wish everyone knew that this school has saved the lives of me and my friends. Students known for depression, suicidal ideations, learning disabilities, or an overall distaste for education have been saved by this school,” she said.
The SOI building located at 601 Selma Rd. was originally built as an elementary school. It transitioned to a special education building and then changed to Keifer Academy before opening as the SOI in 2018 for district high schools students to take part in project-based learning that teaches them how to solve real-world problems.
To support students and families through the transition, the district will provide individualized scheduling meetings for every SOI student beginning in January, along with an open house to introduce SOI students and families to Springfield High School programs and ongoing communication and resources for staff and families.
“The district understands that change is not always easy, but district and building leadership are working with families to make the transition as smooth as possible,” Hill said.
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