SAUGUS – According to recent enrollment figures the student population is not only growing, there seems to be a growth spurt at the high school.As of October student enrollment figures hovered around 2,927 but Superintendent Richard Langlois said the student population is actually up since then.”It doesn’t reflect the complete enrollment,” he told the School Committee Thursday. “We’re at a little over 3,080 students.”Student enrollment nose-dived just last April when then Superintendent Keith Manville reported that nearly 900 students had chosen to attend schools out of district rather than attend Saugus Public Schools.Langlois said now there seems to be an ongoing growth spurt at the high school, but he admitted the middle school numbers are still down. The fact the Belmonte Middle School is still coming up short on enrollment figures, however, does not surprise him.Langlois said the middle school is still undergoing restructuring and has failed to make Adequate Yearly Progress for two years. It is also lacks foreign language classes.Ironically the impact of the middle school’s shortcomings seems to be hardest felt on the ninth grade level.Langlois said one of the most notable changes in enrollment figures is there appears to be a significant drop in numbers between eighth and ninth grade. He said the number of eighth graders bests the number of ninth graders by nearly 100, which is unusual.Other enrollment changes include the growing number of English Language Learners and a significant jump in the number of students on free and reduced lunch.Langlois said he was unsure why enrollment figures were on the rise but said the economy could have something to do with it. With the cost of private school presumably increasing along with everything else parents may be turning back to public school out of necessity.Of the students who opted out of the public system last year, 162 attended Our Lady of Assumption in Lynnfield and nearly 100 more headed to St. Mary’s in Lynn and about 60 to St. Mary’s in Melrose. Another 50 went to Malden Catholic and 40 each attended Pope John and Mystic Valley Regional Charter School.Langlois said he would like to think that the numbers are increasing because students are coming back to a system that is changing for the better.”I’d like to think they’re coming back because we’re putting a lot of energy into the district and that we have goals,” he said.