East Pennyroyal News

There were 2,954 students enrolled in McCreary County School District schools in the 2022-23 school year, 1.8% less than the previous year, according to the Kentucky Department of Education.

Of all the students welcomed in the 2022-23 school year, 52.3% of them were boys, and 47.7% were girls.

Data also shows that most of the students were white, representing 96.4% of the district's total enrollment.

McCreary County School District roughly covers four schools within McCreary County and has a main office in Stearns.

Among the four schools in McCreary County School District, Pine Knot Intermediate School recorded the highest enrollment of 902 students in the 2022-23 school year.

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.

Data also shows that between 2019 and 2023, there was an increase of 260% in the number of available teaching posts in Kentucky schools. This often leads to larger class sizes, combining programs, and retaining staff despite potential negative impacts on teacher working conditions.

School Name	Total Enrollment in 2021-22	Total Enrollment in 2022-23	% change
Pine Knot Intermediate School	900	902	0.2%
McCreary Central High School	872	796	-9.5%
McCreary County Middle School	602	651	8.1%
Whitley City Elementary School	632	605	-4.5%