photo by Hannah Reel

Vidalia Upper Elementary School fifth-grade science teacher Suzie Blanchard leads her class in a lesson on plants during class Wednesday. Enrollment across the Concordia Parish School District is up 50 students this year.

Parish schools see enrollment numbers go up

By Vershal Hogan (Contact) | The Natchez Democrat

Published Saturday, August 22, 2009

VIDALIA — Concordia Parish school district officials thought enrollment was going to be down this year, but the district is up 50 students from the same period in the 2008-2009 school year, Director of Academics Paul Nelson said.

Officials believed enrollment was going to drop because of the general economic climate, Nelson said.

“We were afraid we were going to see some more people leave the area and pursue jobs elsewhere,” he said.

Total enrollment Friday was at 3,950.

When school began two weeks ago, the Ferriday schools reported a dip in enrollment, but those numbers have since recovered, Nelson said.

“Nearly every school has been in a position to gain a handful of (students),” he said.

The school with the single biggest gain was an unlikely contender — Monterey School.

Monterey has picked up 25 more students this year than last year, Nelson said.

The overall impact of that increase, however, shouldn’t affect classroom availability because Monterey is a kindergarten through grade 12 school.

“To pick up 25 is good, but it is easy to absorb that versus if we were to go to Vidalia Upper Elementary or Vidalia Junior High and try to dump in 25,” Nelson said. “You essentially have two additional students in the second grade, two more in the fifth, two more in the seventh, et cetera.”

None of the schools are at capacity yet, Nelson said.

“You might get in situations like we have at Ridgecrest School where you get one classroom per grade, but as a general rule we have more room to absorb more students,” he said.