Future of historic Southern Nevada schoolhouse still unknown months after closure

More than six months after the Clark County School Board voted to shutter Goodsprings Elementary School, it remains unknown what will become of the historic schoolhouse.

The Clark County School District and the Las Vegas-Clark County Library District remain in early exploratory discussions about converting Goodsprings Elementary into a library for the school’s namesake town located roughly 40 miles southwest of Las Vegas, according to spokespeople for both districts.

“We are conducting our discovery and due diligence to better understand the operational, financial, and facility considerations associated with the opportunity,” said library district spokesperson Lisa Jacob in an email Tuesday. “Our priority is to complete a thoughtful review so that any future decision is based on a clear understanding of the potential benefits, responsibilities, and long-term impacts to the Library District and the Goodsprings community.”

Both districts said no decisions have been made about the school’s future, and there is no timeline for when an agreement could be made. The library district currently operates a small library adjacent to the school.

Goodsprings Elementary officially closed on June 30 after school district officials decided the $1 million cost to keep running the school was not worth it to teach the one student who would have attended it this school year. The rural schoolhouse, which was open for 113 years, was recognized as the longest-operating school in Nevada.

Meanwhile, the school district is on the hook for maintaining the facility despite no students attending it. It would require the district to make an agreement with another operator for the school district to be free from those maintenance costs, according to reference materials associated with the school closure plan.

Asked how much the school district spends per month to maintain the campus, a district spokesperson said, “existing staff working at nearby schools perform the minimum necessary maintenance, so no specific dollar amount is attributable to maintaining” the schoolhouse.

Part library, part museum?

In addition to books, the Goodsprings Historical Society has had conversations with both districts to utilize the building by displaying some of the old mining town’s historical artifacts inside the schoolhouse.

Steve Fleming, president of the Goodsprings Historical Society and an alumnus of the elementary school, said both districts have been receptive to giving the society room in the building to showcase pieces of the school and town’s history.

“We as a historical society have a great history of the school, which has been compiled over the last 40 years and that probably is as good as any rural school in the country,” Fleming said.

Goodsprings Elementary School is in the National Register of Historic Places, and Fleming said he finds it meaningful to preserve history in the place that it occurred. He hopes to display materials about the school’s history inside of the schoolhouse, rather than the society’s museum, which is in Goodsprings’ original post office.

“It’s important, basically, to show people how pioneers, or early people in Nevada, how they made it work in this pretty harsh environment that is now home to close to three million people,” Fleming said.

Fleming hopes to see the schoolhouse’s bell ring once again should it reopen.

“It certainly has the capability and, I believe, the potential to be a great plan,” Fleming said. “It will allow the library to have a good facility … and it will also allow us as a historical society to have a place that is in the most historic building in our community.”

Contact Spencer Levering at [email protected] or 702-383-0253.