SE Kentucky News

There were 310 11th grade students enrolled in Bell County schools in the 2022-23 school year, 12.7% less than the previous year, according to the Kentucky Department of Education.

Bell County High School welcomed most of the 11th grade students in the county, registering 170 students.

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

Statewide, Bell County ranked 39th in enrollment numbers. It was also ranked 39th 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 11th Grade Students Enrolled	% of Student Body	Total Enrollment
Bell County High School	170	23%	740
Middlesboro High School	83	22.1%	375
Pineville Independent School	47	7.3%	641
Middlesboro Alternative School	6	13.6%	44
Middlesboro Group Home School	4	13.3%	30