Junior Drivers Update

Good afternoon, Saranac Families,

We know that many of our juniors and their families were hopeful that junior driving privileges would be available this school year. We understand the independence and convenience that driving to and from school provides, and we recognize that this is an important issue for many families.

After carefully reviewing our parking capacity and projected enrollment, we are unable to extend driving privileges to juniors for the 2026–2027 school year.

At this time, the high school parking lot has approximately 170 spaces that must accommodate faculty, staff, guests, and student drivers. We also have middle school faculty and staff who utilize the lot. With our current class sizes—particularly the number of students in the upper grades—we simply do not have enough parking capacity to safely and fairly extend this privilege to juniors.

Unfortunately, this is not expected to be a short-term issue. Based on our current enrollment numbers, we do not anticipate being able to offer junior driving privileges for at least the next four school years. We want to be transparent with families about this rather than create an expectation that the policy may change from year to year. 

We understand that this may be disappointing news, particularly for our juniors and their families. Please know that this decision was made after careful consideration of our available space. With that, we wanted to give families as much notice as possible given this is not the outcome anyone had hoped for. 

We will continue to monitor enrollment and parking capacity and will revisit the situation if circumstances change. If additional parking opportunities become available in the future, we will reevaluate. Thank you for your understanding, patience, and continued partnership. 

Stephanie Murphy
Principal