AZUSA, Calif. -- The Azusa Unified School District will consolidate and close two schools at the end of this school year as a result of declining enrollment.

Both Mountain View Elementary School and Gladstone Elementary School are set to close their doors.

William Rheaume’s daughters both attend Mountain View. He was prepared to drop his oldest daughter at a new school next year when she heads to middle school, but now his younger daughter will be dropped off much farther away from home.

“We don’t really feel great about it because our school has become a family,” Rheaume said. “And to have her have to travel so much further, I mean the school is literally around the corner, and to have her have to go another mile and a half for us isn’t really going to work.”

He is concerned that his daughter Alexandrea may not maintain a spot in the Spanish language dual immersion class.

“If she stays in dual immersion, all is well. But the problem is there is only, from what I hear, 16 spaces, and if she doesn’t get in, than we’re just going to take her out and put her in the regular class,” Rheaume said.  “Problem being is she’ll be behind, because she’s been learning in Spanish for a year and you stick her in normal classes and she’ll be behind.”

District Superintendent Linda Kaminski said students should be able to stay in the dual immersion program that is being transferred to another school. She acknowledges the inconvenience facing families, but says the district had to make the tough decision to close schools.

“It’s a demographic change. There just aren’t as many families with young kids,” Kaminski said. “Their kids have grown up or families have moved out where maybe the job market is better for them or the housing market is more affordable. It’s affected a lot of districts in this general area.”

The Superintendent says the board will look into leasing the two closing campuses next year. Receiving revenue will help the district tackle the $3 million dollar cuts it needs to make.

“We anticipate we will save about $500,000 for each of the two schools that are closing, which is a million dollars and we have to cut almost $3 million,” Kaminski said. “So that gets us very far along in terms of savings. And the rest of the savings we’ll do internally with additional cuts wherever we can.”

Rheaume said he and other parents understand that cuts have to be made. But, they aren’t satisfied with the available options for their students.

“Parents are just concerned about where their kids are going to end up. A lot of parents are thinking about pulling their kids out of the district completely,” Rheaume said. “I think the district is going to lose a lot of kids here.”