Monomoy School District Sees Mixed Bag in Enrollment Numbers

HARWICH – There is good news and bad news when it comes to the enrollment numbers in the Monomoy Regional School District.

Superintendent Scott Carpenter told Selectmen in Harwich this week that the middle and high schools have seen an increase in students over last year while the number of students opting to go elsewhere has dropped.

The middle school has seen enrollment grow by 6 percent with a 1.5 percent increase for the high school.

“The big thing was let’s try to keep our Harwich and Chatham families with us in the school district and see fewer of our children choicing out to charter schools or other school districts,” Carpenter said. “And I think the numbers that we see are really positive in that direction.”

More alarming for the district was a decrease in the student populations at the elementary level, with a 12 percent drop in Chatham and a 3 percent decrease in Harwich from last year.

“We see a school district that’s seeing an age shift where we are seeing decreasing numbers at the elementary levels,” Carpenter said.

Carpenter said that is a trend that occurring across the Cape.

“You have fewer and fewer families with school-age children,” he said. “I think it is something that we as two towns, Chatham and Harwich, might need to look at if there are things we can do in our two towns to keep more families with us.”