North Kentucky News

There were 1,841 eighth grade students enrolled in Boone County schools in the 2022-23 school year, 3.1% less than the previous year, according to the Kentucky Department of Education.

Gray Middle School welcomed most of the eighth grade students in the county, registering 351 students.

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

Statewide, Boone County ranked fifth in enrollment numbers. It was also ranked fifth 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 8th Grade Students Enrolled	% of Student Body	Total Enrollment
Gray Middle School	351	33.2%	1,057
Conner Middle School	301	32.5%	927
Ockerman Middle School	258	36.2%	713
Rector A. Jones Middle School	248	32%	774
Camp Ernst Middle School	246	32%	769
Ballyshannon Middle School	231	35.5%	651
Walton-Verona Middle School	145	25.8%	562
ACCEL Academy	32	8.6%	372
Rise Academy	29	14.4%	202