![\"essexenrollment\"](\"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/01\/essexenrollment.png\")
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Essex, Iowa’s fourth-smallest district operating a high school, is telling parents it faces a “challenging dilemma.”<\/p>\n
KMA reported on a Jan. 26 meeting<\/a> where Superintendent Paul Croghan\u00a0said it was time to start looking at whole-grade-sharing options with neighboring districts. All of them except Stanton (the second<\/em>-smallest district operating a high school, and geographically not a great fit) are much larger. Croghan pointed out the area’s continued population decline:<\/p>\n “But, you just look–in the last 10 years, when we were competing for those banners, there was a Farragut banner, a Nishna Valley, a Villisca, a Malvern, and a Hamburg. That’s five schools in our conference alone, in 10 years, that no long graduate kids.”<\/em><\/p>\n The members of the Corner Conference know exactly what it means when the state comes knocking, after the Farragut district got nuked in 2015-16<\/a>. Essex isn’t there right now, but the enrollment projections aren’t good.<\/p>\n Between 1958 and 1963, Essex tried repeatedly to consolidate with the even smaller town of Coburg just to the north, only for plans to be torpedoed by either a court or the state. A reorganization without Coburg was approved in 1964. Coburg was attached to Red Oak three years later, according to this court case<\/a>, although it’s not on the official list of post-1965 changes.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Essex, Iowa’s fourth-smallest district operating a high school, is telling parents it faces a “challenging dilemma.” KMA reported on a Jan. 26 meeting where Superintendent Paul Croghan\u00a0said it was time to start looking at whole-grade-sharing options with neighboring districts. All … Continue reading