Franklin County, Russellville schools off to good start

By Staff
Melissa Cason
The 2009-2010 school year got off to a smooth start this week, officials said.
Russellville Superintendent Don Cox said the start of classes went about as smooth as could be expected.
"We always have a few students who start school a few days late because of different family activities and traffic is always an issue at the start of school," Cox said. "But, we are very pleased with the way the year has started."
Cox said enrollment is down about 35 students this year due to families relocating.
"We lost around 35 students from last year," Cox said. "We've tried to track them to see where they went. Most of them left because their families relocated to other states to find work."
While enrollment is slightly down, Cox doesn't anticipate that to be an issue at this point.
Franklin County Superintendent Gary Williams said the year has started out well at all of the seven county schools.
"Everything is going very well at this point," Williams said. "We really don't expect to have any major issues at this point."
Enrollment at the county schools is about the same as last year with the exception of Tharptown.
Williams said Tharptown gained more than 50 students this year.
"The elementary has 22 new students and the high school gained 59 new students this year," Williams said. " We expect the trend to continue with Tharptown."
The cause for the dramatic increase of the enrollment can be contributed to the changes made last year with the Lawrence County School System.
"We welcome any prospective student to Franklin County," Williams said.
Now that the first week of school is behind them, both systems are looking forward to a good school year ahead.