MAUI >> In Santa Cruz County schools, enrollment has been dropping, in part, because of the exorbitant cost of living driving young families to other, more affordable communities.

In Maui, where kids were supposed to be back in school a month ago, the question is where will many even find a school to attend?

Since the Aug. 8 wildfires, the number of displaced West Maui students who have not enrolled in new schools stands at 1,208. The Oahu-based state Department of Education has said these students can relocate to locations in Central and South Maui for the time being. Nearly 3,000 students were enrolled in Lahaina-area schools prior to the fires.

But going to schools in these locations will mean a bus or parental ride that can take 45 minutes to an hour one way. And teachers say that commute, that passes through the burn zone, could be an emotional trigger for many students already traumatized by the fires that destroyed one elementary school and damaged three others in Lahaina.

Instead of relocating, teachers are asking for temporary sites in the Ka’anapali or Kapalua resort areas to keep students together. While the Kamehameha III Elementary campus on Front Street in Lahaina was damaged beyond repair, the state says three other campuses serving West Maui students — Princess Nahi‘ena‘ena Elementary, Lahaina Intermediate and Lahainaluna High — will reopen at a yet-undetermined date once they are deemed safe for students and staff to return.

But, there are no obvious solutions for families who find themselves in a situation unimaginable a month ago, back when students and parents were buying school supplies and getting excited about their new teachers.

Many Lahaina families are staying with friends or family elsewhere on Maui, in emergency hotels on the island or in other parts of Hawai’i. Some have moved to the mainland. Two Lahaina children have been confirmed dead, a 7-year-old boy and a 14-year-old boy, though officials still have not identified all the 115 victims known to have died.

At least 103 teachers and employees of Lahaina schools have reported that their homes burned, but all staff members are believed to have survived the fire. Teachers have been on paid administrative leave since the fire.

The local schools’ issue came to a head last week when hundreds of parents streamed to a Kahana church to hear the DOE reiterate that the options for parents are to send their kids across the island, or, fall back to COVID-era online distance learning, or homeschool them. Parents and teachers have said that they lived in West Maui because of the tight-knit community here and fear losing that identity if the state cannot quickly reopen schools in Lahaina.

Some kids have enrolled in private schools, or a small charter in the Napili area, but these are already maxed out in terms of admitting more students. My niece is still considering options for her daughter, who was due to start second grade on the day of the fires. Her husband, who taught at the Kam III school, has been leading calls for establishing temporary school sites in the West Maui area. In the interim, he has started informal classes for first and second graders under a canopy in a local park. The couple will probably homeschool their daughter, while their 14-year-old son is leaning toward commuting to a new high school in Kihei, about a 45-minute ride away.

The fear is that many students will simply forego school this year.

What’s happening on this island is a dramatic example of a trend happening across the U.S., especially in California, where the long school closures during the pandemic changed the way many students and parents think about school. Attendance has become something of an option, with an alarming 25% of U.S. students qualifying as chronically absent, meaning they missed at least 10% of school days.

The biggest reason for the rise seems to be simply that students post-COVID have fallen out of the habit of going to school every day. Correspondingly, test scores show many K-12 students are now far behind in terms of educational proficiency.

As Hedy Chang, who runs Attendance Works, a nonprofit group focused on the problem, told The Associated Press, “The long-term consequences of disengaging from school are devastating.” Which is just what worries parents in West Maui, who are still seeking answers a month after the wildfires.

Don Miller is the Sentinel Opinion Editor.