Burke County school enrollment drops

There are 342 fewer students in Burke County Public Schools this year.
Average daily membership, commonly known as "ADM," fell 2.4 percent to 13,634 during the first month of the 2009-10 school year. Starting enrollment was 13,976 a year ago and 14,141 in 2007-08.
A changed cutoff date for enrolling kindergartners, unusually few births six years ago and outmigration contributed to the loss.
The elementary schools had a net decrease of 236 students (3.7 percent); middle schools, 18 (0.6 percent); and high schools, 88 (2 percent).
As anticipated, a change in the kindergarten cutoff date shrank that grade. The N.C. General Assembly passed a law in 2007, effective this year, that a child must be 5 on or before Aug. 31 to start kindergarten in 2009. The old cutoff date was Oct. 16. Legislators said they wanted to make sure students were ready for formal school when they began kindergarten and educators said the change will help reduce drop-out rates in later years.
Cutting out six weeks' worth of kindergartners could have cut enrollment 11.5 percent. Instead, Burke County's kindergarten classes fell 3.7 percent to 892 in 2009 from 927 in 2008. However, last year's kindergarten was unusually small. By comparison, kindergarten in 2007 had about 1,020 students.
Most children in the 2008 kindergarten — this year's first grade — were born in late 2002 and the first nine months of 2003. The national birth rate hit an historic low in 2002 after the 2001 terrorist attacks. In the next year, 2003, Burke County residents had the fewest births (964) in the past decade, according to the N.C. State Center for Health Statistics.
Burke County's low birth rate resulted from several factors, but the local economy played a large role. The county's local labor force peaked at more than 46,000 people in 2000. Then manufacturers scaled back operations or closed. By 2003 the workforce was down to 43,000 people — a loss of 3,000, many of child-bearing age.
More recently, a lack of jobs is forcing some families — particularly younger ones who don't own houses yet — to leave in search of jobs elsewhere. Local unemployment doubled from December 2007 to December 2008 and has averaged 14.8 percent since January. Each of Burke County's elementary-school grades, except first, experienced a net loss of 15-30 students over the past year.
Spread evenly across 30 schools, losing 342 students — an average of 11 per school — might be barely noticeable.
However, the losses have been uneven and some schools ADM actually grew.
Thanks to an intense effort to bring dropouts back to classes, the two alternative high schools started this year with about 45 more students than the 130 they had a year ago. The two new high schools, Patton and Draughn, also grew when they received full enrollments of underclassmen replacing low complements of juniors and/or seniors. Among the elementary schools, both Salem and Valdese each picked up 24-25 children.
On the other end of the table, Mull Elementary has 47 fewer students; Ray Childers, 39; and Oak Hill and W.A. Young each are smaller by 32.
No school's ADM shrank more than Drexel Primary's. It has only pre-K through second-grade classes. Its enrollment fell by more than one-fifth from about 364 in 2008 to 282 this year.
But Drexel Primary gained something, too, according to veteran principal Jeannie Snipes, who calls her school "a little piece of heaven."
Because it has fewer pupils, the teachers, staff and volunteers can work more on building individuals' self-esteem and can take advantage of more chances to work with students one-on-one. Problems also get prompt attention.
"They are little angels," Snipes said, "but sometimes their little halos will slip off."
Drexel Elementary lost five teachers and two teacher's assistants when state budget cuts forced the school system to reduce employment. However, Snipes took Title I money, that in the past went to remediation specialists, and redirected it to reducing class sizes.
"None of the classes are popping out at the seams," she said.
Drexel's student-teacher ratio remains 17-1. It has 64 children in kindergarten (compared to 85 a year ago), 82 in first grade (where there were 105) and 100 in second (117 in 2008). Pre-kindergarten dropped from three 18-student classes to two.
Do fewer students mean fewer parents involved in the school's parent-teacher organization? Snipes said the opposite is true at Drexel Primary.
Instead of needing the school system's robo-caller to invite parents to PTO meetings, the school can phone parents individually. The personal touch makes a difference, Snipes said, especially with some of the school's minority groups.
"Instead of having like 10 in past years, (at) the last meeting we had 40," she said.
"It's a small group, but they're very active, they're very hands-on and it's rare that one of them isn't in the school every day," Snipes said. "You have your workhorses that're always going to show up. But that was one of my goals this year — to work with getting all of our families involved."
Kim Rudisill, Burke County's director of elementary curriculum, said the school district will continue to make staffing adjustments — just as it did at Drexel Primary — when 2009's small kindergarten and first-grade classes move into higher grades.
"Oftentimes you may have a 'bubble' group that moves through a school or system that requires you to increase or decrease your number of teachers in a particular grade level," she said. "Our elementary principals are excellent about having to make staff changes that meet the needs (and numbers) of the students."
The greater impact on the district may be felt if it loses state and federal funds based on ADM. Burke County Public Schools in 2007-08 received almost $5,700 per student from North Carolina.
At that level, losing 342 children could cost the district almost $2 million.