School enrollment numbers up

The school year is in full swing and with it comes enrollment numbers for the Boulder City public schools.

At Boulder City High School, Principal Amy Wagner said they are at 664 students, which is exactly what they projected. This is up six students from last school year.

“It has been an amazing start to the school year.,” she said. “The energy in the building has been awesome and the students and staff have been working hard to create a positive and safe learning environment.”

Principal Melanie Teemant said Garrett Junior High had projected to have 379 students but to their surprise, that number is 419. There are 114 students in sixth grade, 139 in seventh and 127 in eighth grade.

At Martha P. King Elementary, Principal Jason Schrock said that like Garrett, the actual number of students exceeds what was anticipated. They had projected 342 students but they are currently at 371.

Andrew J. Mitchell Elementary is reporting 376 students, which is about 10 less than last year.

“With that said, we expected this drop in enrollment, and in fact, I thought the drop might be greater than it turned out to be,” Principal Ben Jay said. “The reason for the decline was that the starting age for a child to begin kindergarten changed this school year, as children now have to be 5 years old by Aug. 1 to start school. Prior to this year, students didn’t have to be 5 years old until Sept. 30 to start kindergarten, so, 15% of the students who normally would have started kindergarten were not able to this year.”

He said, typically, they have approximately 100-110 students who enroll in kindergarten every year, but because of the change to when students can start school, they only enrolled 88 children in kindergarten this year.

“We planned for that change and expected it, so we weren’t too surprised with the small group that we enrolled,” Jay said.

As for how things are going so far at Mitchell, he added, “The school year is really off to a great start. The staff and families at Mitchell are just terrific, so the students are wonderful as well. We really believe every child can be a leader, and the kids have begun to set goals and participate in leadership roles in their classrooms and in the school. It’s going to be a really good year.”