At the end of the year meeting of the Londonderry School Board, held on June 20, the May enrollment was reported at 4,417, compared to last year’s 4,384 students. Over the summer, new Superintendent Scott Laliberte has kept a close eye on enrollment to prepare for the upcoming school year and reported his findings to the School Board at their August 8 meeting.
As of August 8, enrollment across the district is up by 74 students, six ahead of projected, according to the database that monitors and keeps track of the enrollment data. The district has “been fortunate” that the students are spread across grade levels and the school has been able to absorb them with little to no change to classroom sizes.
The way the database works is that any time a family calls and asks about making an appointment to tour the school or enroll a new student, they are entered into the database as being a prospective student. Right now, there are 24 open enrollments, but this does not necessarily mean that all of those students will join the district.
One of the “x-factors” in determining student enrollment numbers is getting a count of the students who have left the district. The district has no way of knowing who has left until they receive record requests from the new district. This can be a prolonged process, considering the family must first enroll the student in the new district, then once the paperwork goes through, the new district contacts Londonderry.
As far as individual schools go, North School was mentioned specifically as one that is being watched carefully. They recently added two positions for fifth grade whose classes are “appropriately full,” but the district continues to monitor the numbers. Right now, Laliberte says they are right about, and even a few students short, of what they projected for North School.
While the 2017-18 school year begins on Tuesday, August 29, there are still a large amount of late registrations, according to the Londonderry district website. Peter Curro, the district’s business administrator, added at the end of the discussion that because of the 24 students who could possibly enroll, the bus schedule will not be finalized until the Wednesday before classes start, August 23.