East Pennyroyal News

There were 240 first grade students enrolled in Wayne County schools in the 2022-23 school year, 9.8% less than the previous year, according to the Kentucky Department of Education.

Bell Elementary School is the only school in the county that welcomed first grade students.

Within Wayne County schools, the highest student population was found in ninth grade, with the smallest class sizes seen in preschool.

Statewide, Wayne County ranked 58th in enrollment numbers. It was also ranked 58th the year before.

Despite escaping some of the pandemic's educational disruptions, Kentucky's achievement gaps have remained an issue since 2019. In the eighth-grade reading assessments, for example, Hispanic students scored eight points lower than their white peers, and the gap reached 15 points in math. Black students fared even worse, falling more than 20 points behind and facing a failure rate nearly double that of their white counterparts.

School	# of 1st Grade Students Enrolled	% of Student Body	Total Enrollment
Bell Elementary School	240	47.5%	505