County's largest school already over capacity in its second year

Before the shine has worn off the 2-year-old East Hamilton School, the building already is housing more than 300 students beyond its capacity.

With an enrollment of about 2,000, the middle-high school now has surpassed Soddy-Daisy High School as the largest school in Hamilton County.

Administrators say the 350 extra bodies in the building means classes with up to 30 students and teachers without permanent classrooms who teach from the computer lab.

"It really can stress people ... but we're in this together," assistant principal Eddie Gravitte said Wednesday, the first day of school in Hamilton County. "You can tell in the hallways it's a bit more crowded."

Despite the tight quarters, junior Amy Martin said she was excited for the start of a new year.

"I think we can handle it, even if we have to kick the middle-schoolers out," she said, cracking herself up.

Gravitte said while there seemed to be enough high school teachers, he anticipated the need to hire more middle school teachers in the first months of school.

Growth at the brand-new school start hasn't been much of a surprise. Before it even had a senior class last year, the school opened about 50 students shy of capacity. The school has its senior class this year.

Officials have attributed the enrollment numbers to the growth in the eastern end of the county, transplants drawn to a new school and converts from private school.

Gravitte said the county likely would have to look again at rezoning and sending some of East Hamilton's students back to Ooltewah Middle and Ooltewah High.

Because of computer issues with a brand-new student database, Hamilton County Schools officials said they wouldn't have first-day enrollment numbers until today.

Still, they expect to have gained students over this time last year, when the system started with about 41,000 students.

"We believe there will be growth, but by how much, we don't know," said Danielle Clark, spokeswoman for the school district. "I can say that we had over 40,000 students in the computer, enrolled in school."

Online: Follow Kelli Gauthier on Twitter at twitter.com/gauthierkelli.

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