NC Kentucky News

There were 675 ninth grade students enrolled in Nelson County schools in the 2022-23 school year, 2.2% less than the previous year, according to the Kentucky Department of Education.

Nelson County High School welcomed most of the ninth grade students in the county, registering 228 students.

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

Statewide, Nelson County ranked 23rd in enrollment numbers. It was also ranked 23rd 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 9th Grade Students Enrolled	% of Student Body	Total Enrollment
Nelson County High School	228	28%	813
Bardstown High School	216	31%	697
Thomas Nelson High School	191	27.1%	704
The Academy at Horizons	22	18.8%	117
Bardstown Alternative School	18	23.4%	77