Park County School District 1 is entering the year with an overall higher enrollment of over 100 more students than the previous year and a focus on helping students create “positive connections.”

Going into the school year PCSD1 will have a total of 1,892 students which is a large increase over the previous 1,759.

At Clark Elementary school there are 19 students enrolled which is double compared to last year, Parkside Elementary has a total enrollment of 210, Powell Middle School has a total enrollment of 417, Powell High School has a total enrollment of 586 students and Shoshone Learning Cneter has 22 students. Park 1 Virtual Academy has 16 high school students, eight elementary school students and an unknown number of middle school students. 

At Tuesday’s school board meeting, Superintendent Jay Curtis noted that the number is folded into the middle school population. Curtis also mentioned to the board that a small number of enrolled students usually drop at the start of the year but enrollment will most likely still be at least 100 students greater than last year.

Powell High School and Powell Middle School have started the year with an emphasis on innovation and helping students develop connections.

Powell Middle School’s staff was inspired by Mark Sharenbroich, who spoke to PCSD1 employees last week and encouraged teachers to think ‘what if.’ The goal of this thought process is to put the students first and try something new. The middle school staff decided to move their activities day, called Cubs Day which is traditionally at the end of the week to the first day of school; this gave sixth graders a fun introduction that included games and even a kickboxing class taught by Melanie Matthews, an instructor at Club Dauntless. 

“So coming out of that the teachers, sixth grade teachers, were like ‘what if we did that on the first day of school?’ Just to have a fun, memorable day,” Powell Middle School Principal Kyle Rohrer said. “So when the kids get home, parents say, ‘Well, what do you do?’ They would have something fun to tell rather than fire drills, and, ‘we went through the syllabus.’” 

Rohrer applauded the school resource officers, counselors and teachers who were flexible and changed their plans for this year’s sixth graders.

“Collectively, I think we have a great group and hired some new paraprofessionals and as you can kind of see out there  we got an awesome team of dedicated staff,” Rohrer said. 

Powell High School  revamped its freshmen orientation, now called Panther Strong Transition Day, to better fit with what the staff is trying to accomplish with Panther Strong, an “overarching umbrella,” as described by principal Tim Wormwald that focuses on character, leadership and belonging. Also under this umbrella is Panther Pride which focuses on achievement, class discipline, integrity, unity and leadership. This will be bolstered by activities from a program called Character Strong.

“Character Strong is a program that we’re going to use on Friday mornings, that is geared toward helping students connect in positive ways in school,” Wormald said.

Both Panther Strong and Character Strong are a change from previous years when the high school used a program called Ignition.

“I don’t know exactly how many, or how many years, but I think it’s about 10 years that we’ve done the Ignition program,” Wormald said. “It’s been a really good program for us, but it’s kind of run its course. We got some feedback from students last year that indicated it was time to make a change.”

Wormald believes that Panther Strong has “a potential to impact our culture in a positive way.” He hopes to continue the program and build on it over the years.