Dist. 301 sees enrollment up despite housing market

More than 3,300 students went back to the books Monday at Central Unit District 301.

The district, which had seen an average of 13-percent annual enrollment growth between 2002 and 2005, saw 6-percent growth last year, Superintendent Brad Hawk said.

This year's 150-student increase, about 5 percent, Hawk called "steady," despite an increasingly slow real estate market.

"Even though we've seen a decline in our developer checks, we've seen a steady enrollment increase," he said. "Specifically, we have seen some steady growth in our elementary numbers, especially at Prairie View (Elementary)," he said.

School districts typically grow in one of two ways.

Families either move into new homes that are built within a district's boundaries or a graduating high school class is much smaller than an incoming kindergarten class.

The district is seeing the effects of the second cause of growth, Hawk said.

A decline in state aid and developer impact fees - which help defray the added costs new residents place on local government services, including schools - puts more emphasis on local property taxes to fund operations and programs, Hawk said.

The district received checks in the past two months for 44 new homes. At this time last year, the district had received checks for 58 new homes.

"Going back two years ago, our checks were significantly larger," he said."We're very dependent on property tax. We feel fortunate, though. We anticipate that there will be good commercial growth in the area."

With an increase in enrollment, Hawk said, the district is beginning to feel pressure as large sixth-, seventh and eighth-grade classes are getting ready to enter high school.

District officials are looking to use money from developer fees to build an eight-classroom addition onto the high school's Plato road campus.

"We aren't in need for that just yet," Hawk said.