Perrin CISD makes it through first semester

PERRIN – After a tumultuous first semester for schools everywhere, Perrin Secondary Principal Loren Sell announced what nearly everyone in the room was thinking.

“We made it,” Sell said during the Dec. 17 school board meeting. “It was brutal but we had our semester final exams done today.”

Sell praised the work of his staff including cafeteria, custodial, and teachers, all who had to take on different roles this year as part of COVID, but who all did tremendous job.

“I’m ready for January to get here,” Sell said. “I think we’ll ready for more normal to come back.

The district’s enrollment is at 316 right now with an average daily attendance of 304. The ADA has Superintendent Cliff Gilmore kind of interested as ADA must remain at 296 for the district to remain a Class A school.

“He’ve had a lot of kids in an out of schools this semester,” Gilmore said. “We have a group of about 40 to 50 percent whom are always stable in attendance. “

Gilmore said over the last 10 years the district continues to have a slow but very steady drop in attendance. The district’s attendance rate is 96.58 percent for the overall district but up slightly to 96.79 for grades 7-12.

In other news, the district is looking to save on its electric bill and will be working with ONCOR to get it done.

Gilmore said the company recently came out to check out every light in the district except for the ones at the football stadium and was given a price of $24,309.48 which, over a two-year period, could save the district around $5,000 a month.

Gilmore said he thinks the savings are a bit high but even if it’s just $2,500 a month, that’s a $30,000 savings for a year which is very good.

School board meetings were moved for the next three months due to board members having items in the way. January’s meeting is moved from January 19 to January 18. Both February and march’s meeting will be moved from the 16th to the 22nd of both months.