30 years of middle school enrollment

There's been a lot of talk in Huntington's Highlawn neighborhood about the possible closing of Enslow Middle School in the next few years. Enrollment at Enslow has declined, the building is inadequate ... you know the drill.

So I dug into enrollment numbers to compare what the middle schools in Cabell County looked like 30 years ago compared to today. The numbers revealed some interesting facts. The caveat is that 30 years ago, these schools were junior highs with grades 7, 8 and 9. Today they are middle schools with grades 6, 7 and 8.

And some middle schools have been consolidated. If I understand things correctly, Cox Landing and Salt Rock were consolidated into Barboursville. Ona was moved to Milton. Cammack and West are now Huntington.

Despite that, we can see some trends emerge.

The enrollment numbers.

1977-78 school year: Cox Landing, 235; Ona, 322; Salt Rock, 220; Barboursville, 736; Beverly Hills, 758; Cammack, 636; Enslow, 530; West, 437. Total enrollment was 3,874.

2007-08 school year: Barboursville, 774; Beverly Hills, 478; Enslow, 256; Huntington, 515; Milton, 651; alternative school, 7. Total enrollment was 2,681.

Now let's play with the numbers some.

The Huntington schools had 2,361 students 30 years ago compared with 1,249 today, not counting the alternative school. The outside-of-Huntington schools had 1,513 then and 1,4254 today. Put another way, the Huntington schools had 61 percent of the enrollment then and 32 percent today.

Had Huntington Middle School been in existence 30 years ago, it would have had 1,075 students, compared with 515 today.

Likewise, Enslow's enrollment is less than half what it was then. If you were to combine Enslow and Beverly Hills today, the school would have fewer students than Beverly Hills alone had then (724 vs. 758).

Even in the "growing" eastern end of Cabell County, growth is not across all age groups. Even the Barboursville and Milton areas have fewer children in the middle school age range than they did 30 years ago.