HARDIN COUNTY, Ky. — Students in the former West Point Independent School District started off this school year somewhere new.
Those students now attend Hardin County Schools after a merger was approved earlier this calendar year.
Vine Grove Elementary second grade teacher Memory Jones taught in the West Point district for 12 years. She said teachers who had been there for more than five years were able to transfer to Hardin Co. Schools when West Point closed.
The decision was ultimately made because fewer students were filling the classrooms, and the district was losing money.
Now, those in West Point pay less in school taxes after the closure. It was still a tough transition for some families.
“A lot of worry from the students and the families about what it would be like to go somewhere else and lots of what ifs and unknowns,” Jones said.
Depending on their age and grade level, the former district’s about 150 students are spread out between North Park Elementary, Vine Grove Elementary, James T. Alton Middle School and North Hardin High School.
But even though the closure gives students opportunities in a larger district, it was tough to see it close for those who worked there.
“I think the hardest thing was going from knowing everybody and I had known everybody since they were not even in school yet when their big brothers and sisters were there, to going to where there’s lots and lots of children and you don’t know any of them,” Jones said.
Jones says this year at Vine Grove is going well, but it is much larger than West Point, where everyone grew to become a little family.
Her own children, who are in the first and second grades, grew up around the school. She says it was their second home.
The West Point district did not get to finish out the year in person because of COVID-19.
The school was always a big part of the small community.
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