Although a plummeting economy seems far from over, Westminster’s annual enrollment keeps rising. The school gained nearly 40 new students from the end of the 2008-2009 school year. As of August 18, 2009 the WCA’s enrollment stood at 896 students.
The largest class at Westminster is the freshman class, which has the most students at 163. The smallest class, 7th grade, illustrates that many new students are coming into each grade not only first year middle school students.
Peggy Johnson, Director of Admissions, credits the increase in population to Westminster’s overall strong programs. “It’s a great school program. Parents tell other parents. The athletics are heard of around the community. Westminster also provides a great learning center and word gets around about the quality of teachers,” said Johnson.
The building is currently almost at the maximum capacity, but the move to the new campus will provide the space for up to 1200 students. The enrollment typically goes up around two percent and with the sudden increase, space in the current Ladue Road campus is limited.
Other private schools around the area have been affected by the economy mostly on a negative note. Jim Marsh, Head of School, attended a conference over the summer where only 2 out of 42 schools saw an increase in enrollment. The programs at Westminster are essential in attracting more students despite hard times in the community.
The lack of space imposes many problems for the administration and raises the question of how to accommodate all the students. “From my perspective the climate during lunchtime and finding space for everyone to eat especially with winter upcoming and all students moving inside poses potential problems. [Other challenges are] fitting a thousand people into chapel with it being a huge congregation and the hallways are always more crowded,” said Tim Hall, Dean of Students.
Also, scheduling problems fit into the variety of dilemmas identified by Hall. This has not just been a problem this year, but over the last several years the school’s capacity has been pushed to the limits.
The class sizes are steadily expanding, but are still manageable for teachers. “This [problem] is not new for me because all freshman have to take my class and they are normally huge,” said Brian Burkey, New Testament Teacher.
Before the 2008 fall sports season many teams were bumped up a class or put into a new district because of the rising tuition rate. The football team for instance was moved from class 3 to class 4. Westminster has the potential to move up in not only football, but other areas as well during the move to the new campus.
Faculty and staff were surprised and relieved to hear of the enrollment increase at their summer meetings. Space is an issue, but the continued increase in Westminster’s programs and development was viewed as a definite blessing.