The State Department of Education has approved Francestown’s request to bring a proposal to withdraw from the ConVal School District back to the voters in March 2026.

If voters at the polls approve the proposal, the town would form an independent district for Francestown Elementary School, which currently has fewer than 30 students.

The town is also evaluating withdrawing to lower the cost burden on SAU 1.

“The Board of Education’s decision to accept the minority report allows us to go to the next step: a vote by ConVal School District voters in March on whether we should be allowed to withdraw,” said Charlie Pyle of the Francestown Select Board.

The state DOE’s recent decision is the second time the state has approved Francestown’s minority report in the withdrawal study process. The decision contradicts the recommendation of the ConVal School Board, which voted against Francestown’s first two proposals for pursuing withdrawal in 2024 and 2025.

The ConVal School District, which has faced declining enrollment since the early 2000s, has cited concerns around the inequity of resources in the district and the high cost of maintaining 11 buildings spread across eight towns as the basis for considering the consolidation of schools.

The ConVal School Board has stated that if any town withdraws from the district, costs will go up for the remaining towns.

The board and the SAU have expressed concerns about Francestown’s ability to provide adequate education and services on such a small scale.

The Francestown School Committee, an official town committee representing Francestown, has stated multiple times that its top priority is to keep the elementary school open. In October, the FSC presented its findings to the ConVal School Board. Those findings were based on research and discussions with other small towns that have successfully withdrawn their elementary schools from larger districts. The FSC maintains that it is both feasible and viable for Francestown to run its elementary school as an independent district, similar to models in Mason, Cornish and Hill.

The FSC has stated that Francestown’s middle and high school students who wish to attend public school will be tuitioned back into the ConVal district.

In 2024, the ConVal Feasibility Study Committee rejected proposals by both Francestown and Dublin to withdraw their elementary schools from ConVal. Both towns submitted minority opinions to the DOE in November 2024, and both were approved, allowing the towns to bring the issue to ConVal voters.

In March 2025, both Francestown and Dublin put forward warrant articles for withdrawal. Francestown received 81% approval from voters in town but only 38% districtwide, while Dublin’s article drew 51% support locally and 37% across the district. Under state law, for a withdrawal article to pass, it must receive at least 60% approval in the withdrawing town or 40% across the district.

Francestown’s proposal to withdraw failed by just 80 votes districtwide.

The town first began looking into withdrawing from the ConVal district after ConVal put forth a warrant article in 2023 that would have allowed the district to consolidate the eight existing elementary schools into four. The elementary schools in Francestown, Bennington, Dublin and Temple, all of which had fewer than 60 students, could have potentially been closed, with students from those towns given the option of attending school in a neighboring town.

After the warrant article failed at the polls, ConVal officials stated they will consider other ways to reduce costs, including consolidating the middle schools and the high school.