By Lorenzo Salinas

l.v.salinas@panews.com

 

Many families wait until after Labor Day weekend to enroll their students in school and send them to class. The Port Arthur Independent School District is no exception to this occurrence.

PAISD has had 13 official days of school since it started its school year Aug. 15. The district had actually started earlier than usual thanks to a District of Innovation update where administration chose to move the district’s previous start date away from the end of the month.

The earlier start date was thought to contribute to more students enrolling closer to the Labor Day holiday.

“This year we started earlier due to District of Innovation; so, a lot of students may have been on vacation… not realizing we started early,” superintendent Mark Porterie said.

However, the early start did not appear to adversely affect initial enrollment numbers for the district.

According to Porterie, starting numbers for the 2018-2019 school year were comparable to where the district left off at last year — about 8,500 students.

“We have the same number of students we had at the end of the year,” Porterie said. “But as we look at the numbers, we see them inching up daily.”

Overall, the superintendent expressed optimism about growing enrollment numbers, citing a family of four who had come back to the area after leaving Port Arthur last year.

He said they enrolled with the district once more, something indicative of the trend the district’s enrollment projections have shown.

“Normally, it just depends on the parents,” he said. “Back when I was in school, school started after Labor Day, but that’s too long a time to wait.”

Accordingly, Porterie stressed the importance of starting school within the district at the appointed start date.

“If you miss instruction until after the (Labor Day) holiday, that’s a lot to miss,” he said. “This has been a full 13 days; so, if parents decide to wait, their children are going to be behind.”

The district has no concessions given to students who start the school year after Labor Day — there are no classes or schools that opt to pace their coursework until after the three-day weekend.

“That’s because we have our curriculum,” Porterie said. “It’s based on the state; it’s based on Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills. There’s a certain amount of material the teachers must cover throughout the year.

“They must start on Day 1. We can’t slow down in fairness to the students.”

Porterie said that though there are many reasons why parents might opt to wait to enroll their children until Labor Day holiday, the district has no set data on the number of families who do such a thing.

“It varies,” he said.