A pair of motions aimed at the closing schools were passed by the Williamsburg County School District Board of Trustees during their March 2, meeting. One motion passed allowed the district to refrain from closing up to three elementary schools in 2010. A second motion was passed allowing the board to meet with communities prior to May 1, and then announce which school(s) will close in 2011-12.
The debate whether to close St. Mark, Cades/Hebron or D.P. Cooper Elementary schools has been a long and at times heated affair as arguments in defense of each facility have been brought to the table. In a past meeting, board member Norma Bartelle questioned why St. Mark was placed at the top of the list. “Why would you pick a school that has soaring academic excellence?” She asked. Board member Kent Evans offered his opinion. “There is no way statistically possible that those scores can come out of St. Mark,” he said. “That’s not statistically possible. Get any statistician you want. They’ve been cheating.”  
The debate continued into Tuesday’s meeting as Bartelle argued that the district can save through other means, rather than closing schools. “I contend we could save 2.1 million in the budget by using some of the other strategies given to the board,” she said. Bartelle claimed $300,000 could be saved through furloughs. “It would be better to give up a tiny portion and give up to the larger good.” She added that realignment of staff, travel and supplies would also contribute in monetary savings as well.
Interim Superintendent Linda Huell presented the board with a comparison list, performed by the finance department along with information compiled from a 2009 facilities study conducted by the Caldwell Group. St. Mark and Cades/Hebron were compared and options were specified.
St. Mark experiences the lowest student enrollment of the three schools, will face the 2010 retirement of its principal, have the lowest number of personnel incorporated into other schools and findings in the Caldwell Group results were the reasons given for its potential closure.
The rationale behind closing Cades-Hebron was determined by a non-functioning cafeteria, cost of transporting food, a roof in disrepair, the condition of the drinking water and teachers up for retirement. As for transportation of its students, grades 3 -5 would be absorbed into Kingstree Elementary and Kingstree Junior High would house grades 6-8. It was also stated by a board member that 45 percent of the students who attend Cades-Hebron do not continue on as students of the Williamsburg County School system.
Other issues debated in the meeting were bussing, maintenance, and personnel but before anything is set in stone the board will follow through with community meetings. “I think we have a responsibility to the community to have them comment on what we are doing,” said board chair Norman Gamble after the meeting. “After all, we are elected by them to make decisions. So we owe them more information. I don’t think the community as a whole understands what is happening with budgets cuts, the population of the schools and the entire county, and I think they should be informed of those things.”  But according to board member Charles Garner, postponing the inevitable is a mistake. “We can’t wait and look at next year. If we wait till next year to take a look at it then we’ll be sitting here next year at this time going over the same thing because these communities, for whatever their reason aren’t going to say yes to looking at consolidating their school,” he said. “We were never elected to go along with what is popular. We were elected to look out for the boys and girls of Williamsburg County.” The vote has been cast and meetings with the respective communities are being organized, but the writing seems to already be on the wall. In order to maintain the operations of the school district the board will have to face some tough decisions.