Hello Colgan Families,

Welcome to the fourth week of school!

Official enrollment numbers for schools are calculated based on the students enrolled as of September 30. As of today, we have 2,902 students enrolled. This does not include the 20 students we have in our pre-k program. This is 101 students over the county projection and approximately 845 students over our building capacity. These large numbers present some challenges, but overall, our school handles the crowds well.

Some people mistakenly believe these numbers are caused by our specialty program. I have not yet analyzed the numbers for this school year, but based on last year's numbers, we net gain about 100 extra students because of specialty programs. In other words, between some families choosing to go to other high schools for their specialty programs and out of district students that are accepted and attend our Center for Fine and Performing Arts program, we show a net gain of about 100 students. This number represents just a small fraction of our overcrowded total number.

Over the past three school days, I have visited 12 senior English classes and plan to visit the 15 remaining classes in the coming days. I enjoy these visits as we discuss all sorts of interesting aspects of our school and their senior year. Some fo the topics we discuss include making their senior year special, safety at Colgan High School, making sure they make it to graduation, the dreaded "senioritis," and any other questions they have about their senior year and our school.

Last week I received our 2023-24 School Accreditation Detail Report and have had the opportunity to start to analyze the data. In short, in the nine categories that the Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) uses as indicators (1. Academic Achievement- English; 2. Achievement Gap- English; 3. Academic Achievement- Math; 4. Achievement Gap- Math; 5. Academic Achievement- Science; 6. Chronic Absenteeism; 7. Graduation and Completion Index; 8. Dropout Rate; and 9. College, Career, and Civic Readiness Index), we are at Level One (the top level) in eight of the categories. Only in Chronic Absenteeism are we rated a Level Two (there are three levels). This is a great improvement over last year as we were only rated Level One in five indicators. Additionally, we are the only PWCS high school to be Level One in eight categories.

One small example of positive data from last year is the progress our teachers and students made with Algebra 1 S.O.L. scores. Last year, we have the 10th best scores in PWCS. This year, we have the highest Algebra 1 scores amongst PWCS high schools.

We have so much to be proud of with the work we did last year, and I hope that it reassures you that the work we are focused on is paying off with positive results.

As always, thank you for all you do to support our school and your student.