Are Chattooga County Elementary Schools Good???

[Scraper Enthusiast]

Originally Posted by Chattooga Resident

I am not originally from Chattooga County, and this thread appears to be a little dated, but I'd like to add some clarification to this point of view, becasue while you have a point, it is misleading.

To begin with, yes, the Town of Trion does consistently outscore the other county schools, but not everyone is aware of, or willing to admit to how they accomplish this.

The Town of Trion is very, very small; the city limits are less than 4 square miles. Population is approximately 2,000, and the number of homeowners is somewhere between 500 & 550. (according to the 2000 census) I don't know the exact number, but from all appearances the majority of the homes in the city limits are actually rental property.

There is only one major industry in Trion, Mt Vernon Mills, and it is the only thing that is keeping this town alive. The Town of Trion does not even own a water system, the mill provides the water for the town. Basically, if Mt. Vernon Mills goes away, so does the Town of Trion.

Presently Mt Vernon is working what appears to be a long term military contract for material for the "ABU" uniforms; but their denim operation, which isone of the few left in the US is almost completely shut down. The shutdown of the denim side of their operation, along with the slowdown in the carpet industry in the counties only other major employer, Mohawk Carpets, have contributed to Chattooga County leading the state in unemployment this year.

If you've never spent time here you just can't appreciate how things work in this town. The mill is so integrated with the Town of Trion that a couple of years ago their plant manager complained at a City Council meeting because the town was going to give their employees pay raises. He said that for as long as they could remember the town had always worked with the mill to ensure that the town workers and the mill workers both made about the same, so the mill workers wouldn't complain and try to go to work for the town.

Anyway, back to the main subject. Because the Town of Trion is a "City" school, they are only required to admit students who actually reside within the city limits. They will accept other students provided that they can pass their "admission exams", and if their parents are willing to pay "tuition" to the city school board.

Now, Mt Vernon Mills, which is the counties largest employer, like most textile industries, employs a very large percentage of foreign workers, many who speak absoloutly no english; but the majority of these workers do not reside within the city limits.

I beleive you can already see where this is all leading; unless you can either get a rental house in the Town Trion, or manage to pay tuition to the Trion School System, then you're children are automatically a county school problem.

Now having said all that, neither school system in Chattooga County is outstanding; graduation rates in this county are just deplorable. Of course, when you consider the number of attending students, and the challenges that Mt Vernon and Mohawk have put on the county school system with their hiring practices, I'd say that they are pretty comparable.

Thanks for pointing that out. In the truthful context, the Trion City School System is being charitable by allowing out of district students the chance to attend their schools. If you are out of district and will be a burden on their school system, then why should such a student be admitted?

[Chattooga Resident]

Originally Posted by Scraper Enthusiast

Thanks for pointing that out. In the truthful context, the Trion City School System is being charitable by allowing out of district students the chance to attend their schools. If you are out of district and will be a burden on their school system, then why should such a student be admitted?

I'm not saying they have to admit them, and there's nothing illegal about what they're doing, but they are definitely not being charitable. If they truly wanted to be charitable they would be taking care of the children of the towns one and only employer, instead of consistently using them as a reason to look down on the county school system.

The reality is that the Town of Trion and Mt Vernon have developed a system wherein they hire a large number of non-english speaking residents, but don't allow for the majority of them to reside within their town limits. This forces those children into the county school system, which subsequently draws down their test scores, and then results in the people from Trion claiming that their school system is so much better.

As I said, the Town of Trion does consistently score better than the county schools, but the fact is that neither school system is that great. In fact, given the quality of the student population that Trion and Mt Vernon have forced on them the County Schools do fairly well.

[Live_in_Georgia]

Trion City Schools are not better than Chattooga County Schools. Menlo Elementary is the best elementary school in the county. I graduated from CHS and would proudly send my children there before I would Trion any day. Chattooga County Schhol is more accepting and diverse. The teachers are wonderful. I'd rather my children attend here and be welcomed by ALL their peers than go to Trion with spoiled kids who believe that if you don't wear certain clothes or act a certain way that you do not belong. I'm so tired of Chattooga being in the shadows of Trion because of the pedestal that Trion places themselves so highly on.

[ga__girl_79]

I realize this post is old but I could not resist sharing my experience with both the Summerville school system and the Trion city school system. Let me start by saying that my son was enrolled in Summerville Schools up until the last 2 months of last school year, which was his 5th grade year. He was in the gifted program and had exceeded the standards on the CRCT every year since he was in first grade and was able to accomplish this with attending Summerville. I went to apply for him and my other 2 children at Trion with 2 months left of the school year. They wanted my oldest to start immediately, however wouldn't pro-rate tuition so I had to pay in full. They informed me that they may have openings for my other 2 children at the start of the new school year but had no place for them immediately. So I let him start and of course he was still straight A's and exceeded once again on CRCT. Well I recieved the acceptance letters for my other two children two weeks before school was scheduled to start and had very little time to get there tuition in before school started. He was scheduled to start at the Middle School which of course has a different prinicipal than elementary. I called and explained to the secretary that my oldest would not be attending because I couldn't afford the tuition as my husband had been out of work and we were just getting back on our feet. I tried to call the elementary school about my other two and didn't get and answer. Within 30 minutes I recieved a call from the Middle school Principal asking me what he could do to help me keep him in Trion and asked me if I could afford to pay the tuition monthly and I told him I could but then I had the problem of my other two children and there tuition. He said he would speak with the elementary principal and try to get her to do the same for my other two children so they could all attend and I wouldn't have to drive to 3 different schools. He called me back within 30 minutes and said the elementary school prinicipal was unable to work with me at all on the youngest kids tuition and I would have to pay it in full by the first day of school, he then told me he would give me until November to pay my oldest sons tuition and that he needed to transfer me to the elementary principal. I spoke with her and was informed school board policy stated that tuition was to be paid by the first day of school and she couldn't make an exception. If the tuition wasn't paid by then the youngest two would not be allowed to attend and dropped from there register. I politely thanked her and hung up the phone. I called the next day and thanked the Middle school principal for trying to work with me but my son would not be attending the up coming school year, he would go ahead and release his spot. He was asking me to reconsider and I told him I appreciated him trying to help but I was just going to put the kids in Chattooga. I then called the elementary school and spoke with the principal and told her the same thing. All she said was ok, bye-bye. No thank you for calling and letting us know, kiss my tail, nothing as soon as I said she could release there spots, the reply I got was ok bye-bye.
My point in all this is that since my oldest is an exceptional student they could make an exception for him, but since the other 2 are only average students, it's not that she couldn't make an exception for them, she just wouldn't. It has really made me angry for two reasons:#1 because if the Middle school prinicipal could bend the policy for one of my children, the elementary school principal could have bent the policy for my other two.
#2 Is because she made me feel like since we didn't have the money to pay all of the tuition immediately, my kids weren't good enough or didn't deserve to go to that school.
It is hard enough to have to tell someone that you are struggling financially, but to have to be talked down to in the process was horrible.