SUN PRAIRIE, Wis. — As the City of Sun Prairie grows, the school district is growing with it.
Year after year, Sun Prairie is ranked one of the fastest-growing cities in Wisconsin. That means its housing, infrastructure and schools have to grow too.
“The Sun Prairie School District has grown significantly over the last 10 years,” said Brad Saron, superintendent of the district.
While enrollment the last few years was a rollercoaster for all districts during the pandemic, in the big picture, enrollment has boomed in Sun Prairie.
“Ten years ago we would’ve been underneath 7,500 students,” Saron said. “At the beginning of last year, we were about 8,350 students, which was down from the previous year.”
In 2019, the district went from seven middle schools to nine. Plus, they added the new West High School. There were renovations in schools to enlarge and modernize facilities.
“We are configuring spaces to support more group projects and cross-disciplinary flexibility as our capacity in education grows to support those types of activities,” Saron said.
“School district growth is everything,” said Taylor Brown, the economic development director for the City of Sun Prairie. “The big push for the growth has been the school district. So the school has quickly started accommodating the community by adding more schools, by adding more facilities.”
A big part of the modernization process, through referenda, involved community input. Saron said because of that input, the district has one state-of-the-art stadium for both high schools.
Saron said they expect enrollment to rise again for the 2023-24 school year, which begins Sept. 5.