Granite Bay High School enrolled approximately 200 new students, whose homes fall within the school attendance boundary, as late enrollees in the time frame between July 1, 2024, and August 2024, which is double the typical number of students from previous years. This resulted in the addition of 10 new sections (e.g. the number of instances of a course in the master schedule).
For the 2024-2025 school year, the school population was estimated to be approximately 2,080, and as of the time of this writing, it is approximately 2,040 students, according to Jennifer Buschmann, a GBHS assistant principal.
“The demographer was projecting us super low; … we just didn’t have (a lot of sections) going into the summer,” Buschmann said. “This summer we had an influx of people moving in and also transferring in which added to our jump in enrollment.”
Enrollment at GBHS is open year-round; however, both interdistrict (e.g. transfers between schools of two different districts) and intradistrict (e.g. transfers between schools within the same district) transfers for the subsequent year always close on June 30 of the preceding year. Only students who are within the boundaries of the school are allowed to enroll after June 30.
“(The number of new enrollees) felt more because it was about double what we normally get. We always expect that we’re going to have 100 kids (enroll as late enrollees) in the summer, and we’re going to add some sections, but we’ve not ever added this many sections this late,” Buschmann said.
Each school year, the master schedule is established in the spring of the prior school year based on each student’s initial course selections. Both returning and new students who did not get their original eight courses received their listed alternates instead. Many of those students selected more specialized courses. Many of the late enrollees did not get some of the classes they selected.
“When you get these late enrollees, it’s hard to give them what they want. It’s hard to have flexibility in the schedule as it was already set. And I think students would be a lot happier with their schedules if we knew who was coming and what classes they want(ed) because we can provide those numbers,” Lisa Vaughan, a math teacher, said. “We’re trying to do everything we can for the students and, if (they) just tell us (they)’re coming then we’re able to allocate and without stress.”
Previously, it was rare for teachers to teach during their prep period, as the one free period in their day offered them time to grade work and prepare material for the next day. For the 2023-2024 school year, four teachers in the fall and three teachers in the spring officially taught during their prep period.
“It’s going to be my first time in 27 years teaching on the prep,” Vaughan, who is teaching during her prep period in the spring ‘25 semester, said. “We got to a point in August where we had gotten some other enrollments, and we needed to offer some more classes because our class sizes were getting pretty high.”
This year, eight teachers have to teach during their prep period during the fall and nine in the spring. The teachers had filled out a form before the schedules were made saying that they would be willing to teach during their prep period if the need arose. Some of the teachers had to give up their prep periods; however, these teachers received extra compensation.
“(The school gets the) most qualified applicants (for the additional teacher openings) early in the year,” Vaughan said. “I’ve been doing our math master schedule for 10-15 years now, and what we think we have in May is not what we have in June, July or August.”
Even though there were ten new sections added, there were no teachers that were hired to specifically accommodate for the enrollment increase, partially because the new sections added were across many subjects, and most teachers only teach one subject. Many of the programs GBHS offers are also based on how many students are enrolled.
“The district feels like, if we don’t allow (students) to transfer to their school choice, they might leave the district which ties into that funding formula, and then we lose the student, and we lose the ability to offer more things,” Buschmann said.
Many students who are considering GBHS look into the academic and extracurricular selections. As they enroll, their enrollment contributes to these programs in both participation and funding.
“We have a lot of programs, and so we have a lot of AP, IB offerings. We have high-level sports, high-level performing arts, and so on, and it’s a relatively safe environment … We have a lot of families who, even if they don’t live in our boundary, they’re asking to come in,” Buschmann said. “The more students we have, the more programs we can offer.”
