Enrollment increases in most Valley districts

Continuous Curriculum School in the East Valley School District has seen a 69 percent enrollment jump this year, most notably because students now have a whole building to attend classes, rather than just half.

At the end of last year, the district closed Skyview Elementary School which occupied one half of the building. This year, the Continuous Curriculum School was able to open enrollment to more students and Executive Director of Operations Brian Wallace said the district budgeted for about 375 students at the K-8 school.

“They pretty much filled it up,” Wallace said. The school now has 437 full-time enrolled students, up from 258 last year.

The Continuous Curriculum School is a choice school – it has students not only from East Valley, but from around the county. The school runs on a modified calendar.

“We start mid-August and go to the end of June and have just six weeks off in the summer.” Principal Chiere Martyn said last spring. “That extra four weeks that a traditional calendar would have in the summertime is interspersed in different places throughout the year.”

The school offers guaranteed enrollment until sometime in June. After that, enrollment is based on space availability.

The district as a whole is about 70 students ahead of what it budgeted this year. School officials budgeted for 4,320 FTEs and as of Oct. 1, they have 4,390. Last October, the district had 4,340.

“We’re higher than budgeted right now,” Wallace said.

Of those students, there are 3,832 FTEs in traditional education programs throughout the district and 566 FTEs in nontraditional, alternative learning environments.

In the West Valley School District, the numbers are down slightly from last year.

Deputy Superintendent Doug Matson said the district budgeted for 3,628 FTEs this year, and as of the beginning of October had 3,610 FTE students.

“We budgeted very conservatively,” Matson said.

This year, there are 3,001 traditional FTEs in West Valley, 569 nontraditional alternative learners and about 40 Running Start students.

In October 2010 there were 2,991 traditional FTEs, 637 nontraditional students and 30 Running Start Students. Matson said he expects more nontraditional students as the year progresses.

In the Central Valley School District, there are now 11,808.1 FTE students. Executive Director of Finance Jan Hutton said the district budgeted for 11,760 students, which was based on last year’s 11,780 FTEs.

“We should be pretty much on track with that budgeted number,” Hutton said of the coming months.

In the Freeman School District, there were 906.38 FTE students in the district as of Oct. 1, up from 875.19 last year.

“That’s slightly above budget,” said Fiscal Director Jan Davis. The district budgeted for 895 FTE students.

Freeman is unique in that it has many students from outside the district who choose to attend district schools.

“Our percentage of choice is 23 percent,” said Ellen Hawley, administrative assistant.