Latham on hunt for Lynn school space

LYNN – More than 15,000 students attend local schools – a 22-year enrollment high that has School Superintendent Catherine Latham looking for additional classroom space.Enrollment increased by 470 students between 2013 and 2014 and climbed by more than 1,000 students since 2011, according to School Department statistics Latham shared with School Committee members.?I am in the process of evaluating our space needs,” said told them.Accelerated enrollment worried the superintendent even before school started in September with Latham worrying in June about Drewicz School enrollment. She said Drewicz? enrollment had stabilized by August at 506 students, but warned about a steady increase in kindergarten, first grade and second grade enrollments.Citywide enrollment for these grades in past years totaled about 900 students. Latham in June said citywide enrollment for these grades is now topping 1,300 students.With the school year almost two months old, Drewicz? enrollment stands at 512 students. Ingalls has the largest elementary school enrollment with 738 students and Lynn Woods School, with 168 students, has the smallest enrollment.When all-day kindergarten enrollment approached 1,300 students in October 2012, Latham and School Committee members moved to find space outside elementary schools for kindergartners. School administration offices in the Lynn Vocational Technical Institute annex on Commercial Street relocated to Bennett Street, freeing up space for 250 kindergartners and easing space shortages.School enrollment reports list 13,600 students attending local schools in 1995 at a time when just over a quarter of local students did not speak English as their first language.Limited or non-English speakers now total 71 percent of local students and more than half of public school students are Hispanic, according to a report Latham prepared for her Rotary remarks.Students from 42 countries are enrolled, according to school statistics, in local schools, including 157 students from Guatemala. Last year?s enrollment statistics listed 521 newly arrived foreign students, including 241 Guatemalans.More than half of these students were enrolled in 2013-14 in eighth, ninth and 10th grades and Mayor Judith Flanagan Kennedy earlier this summer said school officials have a difficult time confirming Guatemalan students? ages. She said the city needs federal money to help cover costs associated with educating these students.