A possible indicator of future construction, the newly released 2017-18 Annual Inventory of School Housing for the Cherokee County School District specifically notes the attendance area of Cherokee High School in Canton.
Cherokee schools Superintendent Brian V. Hightower wrote in the report that he and senior staff are evaluating enrollment and capacity options in this area, and that it will be important to provide the school board with “viable options for addressing overcrowding as early as the 2018-19 school year.”
The report uses the district’s 20-day enrollment count to measure overcrowding.
No Cherokee school is “critically overcrowded,” or 140 percent above capacity, but seven are over 100 percent, and that number would have been 11 were it not for portable classrooms: Free Home, Johnston and Liberty elementary schools; Creekland, E.T. Booth, Mill Creek, Teasley and Woodstock middle schools; and Cherokee, Creekview and Woodstock high schools.
Classroom additions are planned at Mill Creek and Woodstock middle schools.
“It should be remembered that, while portable classrooms provide relief for classroom instruction, they do not alleviate overcrowding in media centers, cafeterias, restrooms and hallways,” Hightower said.
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