Buffalo's Schools, Mapped

Every district and charter school in the city. Size is enrollment, shape is the grades served, and color starts as enrollment compared with the school's own peak year, and you can change what it shows. The eight schools the district proposed closing on October 2 are outlined in black.

Also: every school as a pie chart of its students by race and ethnicity, and every district school compared on attendance, suspensions and test results, year by year and this year so far.

District enrollment, 2006 to 2026

    Sources. District schools: the Buffalo Public Schools enrollment dashboard, active students by school and grade, with year-end counts for past years. Charter schools: New York State Education Department BEDS day enrollment, latest year 2024-25. Two charters in that file have since closed (Buffalo Creek Academy, March 2025; Primary Hall, June 2026) and are not shown. None has opened since 2023. Report card measures: NYSED 2024-25. Teachers by year: the school pages of the state's data site. Staffing and cost per pupil for district schools: the School Based Budgets section of the district's 2026-27 proposed budget. Locations: NYS Health Department school file and NCES, moved onto OpenStreetMap footprints. Building ages: the Buffalo and Erie County Public Library's school buildings collection, Buffalo Architecture and History, City of Buffalo historic resource surveys, National Register nominations and news reports, linked on each school's panel.

    Proposed closings are from the district's October 2, 2026 announcement for the 2027-28 school year, with details from its presentation to the Board of Education work session on October 7. The Board has not voted. The district's own list has ten lines, not eight. Seven schools would have their state school code retired: Schools 59, 131, 33, 82, Riverside (208), East Community (309) and Research Laboratory (366). School 90 is listed as a grade reconfiguration: it would become a center for prekindergarten special education. Leonardo da Vinci High School (212), which is not ringed on this map, would take in Research Lab and move into the Riverside building. School 8, the building da Vinci would leave, would be kept as a swing site. Of the buildings, the School 59 classrooms would go back to the Buffalo Museum of Science, the School 131 building would go back to the city, Schools 33 and 82 would become district offices, and the East Community building would house a new program, Buffalo Rising Academy. Each school's panel says what is planned for it, where the district says students would go, how full the district says the building is, and the date of its family meeting. The presentation says the choices rested on enrollment, building use, graduation, attendance and test results, state accountability status and cost per pupil, along with location, building needs, busing and what the building would be used for next. This map has no public data for building upkeep, busing, rent or teachers who travel among buildings. The district's planning estimates, which it says are not final layoff counts: 73 teaching positions (20 of them already planned), 8 principal and assistant principal positions, $2.25 million a year saved on busing, and $1 million set aside for moving and renovations. Public meetings: Oct. 8 (virtual, 2 p.m.), Oct. 15 (Renovation Church, 5:30 p.m.), Oct. 16 (New Covenant United Church of Christ), Oct. 20 (School 156, 5:30 p.m.).

    Who made this. Made by Ryan Sajdak on his own time, from public data. Not affiliated with or endorsed by Buffalo Public Schools.

    Corrections and changes

    This page is being shared, so every change to it is listed here.

    • Oct. 17, 2026. Added a link to a companion page that compares every district school on chronic absence, suspensions and grades 3-8 test results, year by year since 2014 and for this school year so far. Nothing on this map changed.
    • Oct. 8, 2026. Updated every proposed school's panel from the district's October 7 presentation to the Board of Education. Each panel now says what the building would become, where the district says students would go, and the date of the school's family meeting. New for Schools 59, 33 and 82: the School 59 classrooms would return to the Buffalo Museum of Science, and Schools 33 and 82 would become district offices. The Academy School (131) building would return to the city. Added a "How full the building is" section to those panels and to Leonardo da Vinci's, with the capacity and utilization figures the district gave. Where the presentation gives two different figures (Riverside, da Vinci, Research Lab) or a student count that does not match its percentage (School 33), the panel shows both. School 90's label now reads "Proposed to be reconfigured," which is how the district lists it. The note below the list was rewritten to match, with the district's staffing and busing estimates and one more public meeting (Oct. 16). No other numbers changed.
    • Oct. 6, 2026. Fixed the download: for charter schools, the students-per-teacher figure and the sixteen state teacher counts were written one column out of step with their headings. The map and panels were not affected. The download also gains the building columns.
    • Oct. 6, 2026. Added the age of each school's building: a "Year the building was built" option in the "Color by" menu and a section on each school's panel with the year, what the building was built as, additions, reconstruction and architect where known, each with its sources. The year is for the main part of today's building. No agency publishes these, so they were looked up one building at a time; 65 of the 85 schools shown have a year and the rest are left blank. Where sources disagree the panel says so. No other numbers changed.
    • Oct. 6, 2026. The panels for five of the eight schools now say what the district plans, as reported by The Buffalo News: Research Laboratory High School (366) would merge with Leonardo da Vinci High School rather than simply close, the Riverside (208) and East (309) buildings would get new programs, the Academy School (131) would be replaced by a new alternative program, and School 90 would become a prekindergarten special education center. Research Lab's label now reads "Proposed to merge." Leonardo da Vinci's panel now notes that it would move. Added the 86% busing figure to School 33's panel and the district's other stated factors to the note below the list. No numbers changed.
    • Oct. 5, 2026. Added a link to a companion map that draws each school as a pie chart of its students by race and ethnicity. Nothing on this map changed.
    • Oct. 4, 2026. Added a note saying who made the map and that it is not affiliated with Buffalo Public Schools.
    • Oct. 4, 2026. Added Regents exam results (share scored 65 or higher, by exam) to high school panels and to the "Color by" menu, from the state's 2024-25 report card. Also added a "Largest racial or ethnic group" color option.
    • Oct. 4, 2026. Charter school panels now show who attends (economic disadvantage, English learners, students with disabilities, race) from the state's 2024-25 file, so the "Color by" measures for those cover charters too.
    • Oct. 4, 2026. Added a "Color by" menu. Schools can now be colored by enrollment change, who attends, chronic absence, test proficiency, graduation rate, state accountability status, spending per student or students per teacher. Enrollment compared with peak is still the default. A link remembers the choice.
    • Oct. 4, 2026. The two closed charter schools (Buffalo Creek Academy and Primary Hall) are no longer shown on the map or in the download. They were already left out of the totals.
    • Oct. 3, 2026. The long enrollment chart on each school's panel now also shows the number of teachers each year from 2009-10 to 2024-25, from the state report card site, which has no teacher counts before that. The state changed how it counts teachers in 2017-18, so the line is drawn in two pieces.
    • Oct. 3, 2026. Each district school's panel now has a chart of students and budgeted teachers for each year from 2021-22 to 2026-27, with students per teacher. Librarians are counted as teachers.
    • Oct. 3, 2026. Added staffing and cost per pupil to each district school's panel, from the district's 2026-27 proposed budget: teachers, all staff positions, students per teacher, school budget. Charter panels show the federal teacher count for 2024-25.
    • Oct. 3, 2026. Charter schools that teach at more than one address are now drawn campus by campus: Charter School for Applied Technologies, Tapestry, Buffalo Academy of Science (both charters), Western New York Maritime and REACH Academy. The state reports one enrollment number per charter, so each campus shows the grades taught there.
    • Oct. 3, 2026. Added Charter School for Applied Technologies, which was left out at first because it is chartered in Kenmore-Tonawanda. The charter total rose to include it.
    • Oct. 3, 2026. Two charter schools in the state's latest file have closed and are now marked with an X and left out of the totals: Buffalo Creek Academy (March 2025) and Primary Hall Preparatory (June 2026). No charter has opened in Buffalo since 2023. Health Sciences Charter added a second building this fall, noted on its panel.
    • Oct. 3, 2026. Color no longer shows grade level. Color now compares each school's enrollment with its own peak year, and shape shows the grades served.
    • Oct. 3, 2026. Fixed: clicking a school on the map closed its panel at once. Fixed: Elmwood Village Charter School Hertel was drawn at the Days Park address.
    • Oct. 3, 2026. First published.