News Talk 94.1/AM 1600 Where The Upper Cumberland Talks
Approaching fall break, student enrollment numbers across the Upper Cumberland have stayed mostly steady from a year ago.
A few counties actually reported slight decreases in enrollment. Overton County Attendance Supervisor Christy Miller said homeschooling seems to be more of a factor.
“We do have quite a few students who withdrew to do homeschool or a virtual school program,” Miller said. “I think that mostly has come about through our time of COVID and getting back to school with post-COVID. I think COVID just opened the door for kids and parents to see the side of homeschool or virtual school that they didn’t know before.”
Pickett County Director of Schools Diane Elder said they have also have seen a few students leave the school system for homeschool. Elder said she has concerns with the enrollment numbers as even though the decrease is not drastic the numbers have continued to decrease over the past couple of years.
“We have continually declined over the years for various reasons,” Elder said. “It is very concerning that we are so small. We are at right now less than 600 students and that is very concerning cause we still have those roofs we have to keep repaired and if we don’t have the students coming in we don’t have the money coming in from the state department.”
Fentress County Director of Schools Kristi Hall said over the next couple of months she expects the numbers to constantly shift.
“We always have students that are transient,” Hall said. “Sometimes they will leave and a lot of times they will come back, so a lot of transient kids that move around throughout the school year. We will see kids come in and leave and that’s just pretty normal.”
White County Director of Schools Kurt Dronebarger said with the county zoning for elementary schools they keep a close eye on the student-to-teacher ratio. Dronebarger said they are continuing to accept more students.
“Right now our numbers are good and our ratios are good,” Dronebarger said. “There are state ratios that we have to hold but we like to stay a little bit below those as well to make sure that we have good student-to-teacher ratios and have the best teaching environments possible.”
Dronebarger said enrollment has been down since pre-COVID. Dronebarger said more people are moving to the White County area and time will tell if the enrollment numbers will return to the pre-COVID numbers.
