Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

S.W. Snowden Elementary is officially closed. 

The Beaufort County Board of Education voted 6-3 on Tuesday, June 3 to close the K-8 school in Aurora. Snowden was the only school in Aurora. 

Board members who voted in favor of closing Snowden were: Gary Carlson, Eltha Booth, TW Allen, Carolyn Walker, David Hudson and Donald Shreve. 

Board members who voted in opposition to the closing of Snowden were: Charles Hickman, Stacey Davis and Terry Williams. 

Williams’ vote surprised many people in the audience including Joy Dunn who is the executive director of the Aurora Richland Township Chamber of Commerce on Main Street in Aurora. Dunn said she was “shocked” by his vote. 

Williams previously voted to tentatively close Snowden on Mar. 25 when the board voted 7-2. At that time, Charles Hickman and Stacey Davis voted in opposition. 

Williams believes the Board of Education was forced to vote on the future of Snowden, because the Beaufort County Board of Commissioners voted on Monday night in favor of maintaining the school system’s annual budget of $18.46 million. The commissioners have voted to keep the school system’s annual budget the same for the last five consecutive years. 

(The county commissioners voted on a budget of $16.139 million for the 2025-2026 school year which does not include capital improvement project funding which puts the total budget to $18.46 million.)

“I’m looking from 2021 through last night, when the commissioners approved the budget. When you look at this and we’ve asked for a total all through there and we’re shorted over 10 – I put $10 to $11 million,” Williams said, “that’s why we’re in the position we’re in tonight. So if anybody wants to write anything about a board or anything, maybe you need to rethink which board you’re talking about.”

By maintaining the same budget amount for five years, the school system has lost an estimated $11 million, Superintendent Dr. Matthew Cheeseman explained. “Your funding has been short of $6.5 million over the last five years to six years by your local county commissioners. Including another five [million] that was short from your request this year. So in actuality it’s $11 million over six years of what you looked for.” 

To learn what went into the the Board of Education’s decision to close Snowden, read earlier articles here. 

Though Dunn and audience members were surprised by Williams’ vote, overall, people were not surprised by the vote. Dr. Patricia Horton-Albritton, principal of S.W. Snowden Elementary, said she was “not surprised” by the closure. 

She continued to say that she “appreciates” the support Snowden has received from students, their families and from community members over the last four years. “I wish them all the best,” she said.   

Dunn continued to say that she wished board of education members and Snowden employees, “could have come together, to the table, and reasoned this through so that we could all be so very sure of this whole process, because a lot of it just does not feel like it’s all fair…Maybe we could have collectively figured out something.” 

After the meeting, the Daily News spoke to Beaufort County residents with ties to S.W. Snowden. 

Stewart Ham and Travis Martin graduated from Snowden in 1980. 

“It’s a sad day,” Ham described. “You would think they would look for other options and closing it would be the very last. I think there’s too many other options out there rather than to just say let’s close it,” 

“They tell our children at school to push past, be persistent, don’t give up, don’t quit when things get tough. If we tell them that, we need to be doing it ourselves. The school board needs to be doing it. The superintendent needs to be doing it. You push past. Don’t shut something down and say there’s nothing else you can do, because there are things you can do. There are options out there.” 

Martin said closing Snowden is a “stumbling block for Aurora” amidst several positive, upcoming  things that will help the 450-member community. These positive things are: Agape Health Services renovating a building on Third Street and bringing healthcare, the possibility of Goodwill Industries of Eastern NC bringing a community food market on Fifth Street and an industrial park which will have a groundbreaking ceremony later this month. 

“I still think Aurora’s gonna make a comeback, but this is a stumbling block for it,” Martin said.