Starkville
- Thread starter AttalaDawg72
- Start date
trending up from rock bottom. The school system was a above average school system for quiet sometime, but completely fell off a cliff. I've heard and believe they are trending up, but it wasnt hard to trend up from where they were over the last few years.
2 problems holding Starkville back:
-Schools
-The hospital
Both are mediocre at best. Both are political.
When businesses are looking to invest in a community, schools is one of the main things they look at. Good schools bring more industry which bring more working age adults which bring more people which bring more industry. Google the Mississippi Counties ranked by growth (there are only a few growing) and compare the school systems to those that don't grow.
A first class hospital attracts retirees which is where the money is. A first class hospital is a massive employer/business with the highest paying jobs... more money. Oktibbeha County hospital is owned by the County and the Hospital Board is appointed by the County Supervisors. So, the board is NOT based on expertise in business and medicine, but your mama an' dem. I am sure they are great people, but the hospital does nothing well. Why does everybody go to Columbus or Birmingham? Why does the hospital lose the young, more talented doctors to other Mississippi towns?
Fix those two things, and you will change the whole region.
-Schools
-The hospital
Both are mediocre at best. Both are political.
When businesses are looking to invest in a community, schools is one of the main things they look at. Good schools bring more industry which bring more working age adults which bring more people which bring more industry. Google the Mississippi Counties ranked by growth (there are only a few growing) and compare the school systems to those that don't grow.
A first class hospital attracts retirees which is where the money is. A first class hospital is a massive employer/business with the highest paying jobs... more money. Oktibbeha County hospital is owned by the County and the Hospital Board is appointed by the County Supervisors. So, the board is NOT based on expertise in business and medicine, but your mama an' dem. I am sure they are great people, but the hospital does nothing well. Why does everybody go to Columbus or Birmingham? Why does the hospital lose the young, more talented doctors to other Mississippi towns?
Fix those two things, and you will change the whole region.
Tell me what the mayor can do to improve Starkville school district. She has no power over the school admin or school board.
Also, referring to a B school district as deteriorating is disingenuous especially considering they consolidated with two failing high schools less than a decade ago.
starkville was a D school at one point.
They are considered a B school district now because there is a huge category where you get points for improvement. Once they cant improve anymore you'll see the district fall back into that C range. Which is about all they can do at this point.
What can the mayor do? Make starkville the type of city that middle class people want to live in and want their children to grow up in. It was once that, and not too far ago. The steps Spruill has taken to try to make it into Oxford and Tupelo, and cater to the university... hasnt led to that.
The mayor should be leading the charge, but don't underestimate the Board of Supervisors and the School Board. The Supervisors have more power than the Mayor.
See my comments above about the Hospital Board (appointed by the Supervisors). A hospital board should be comprised of brilliant leaders in business, finance, and medicine. Again, I am sure they are fine folks.
I just searched the internet, lo and behold, there is a proposal before the County Supervisors to sell the OCH. A sale has been proposed in recent past but failed because local politics was afraid private leadership would eliminate the nepotism.
If the right buyer were to take over, this would be a potential boon to Starkville's economy.
Oktibbeha County's hospital could soon be sold [WTVA]
If the right buyer were to take over, this would be a potential boon to Starkville's economy.
Oktibbeha County's hospital could soon be sold [WTVA]
I see so many kids from State families heading to OM now it makes me sick - mostly from JA or Prep around here, but it's happening elsewhere too. No matter when it started, Kiffin or before, OM right now is getting what they've always yearned for - to be known as a "party school". Unfortunately, teenage kids are influenced by this marketing. And the more the instate kids go up there with the express intent to "party", the more out of state kids will choose that as their backup school when they can't get in to UGA or UT. If you are going to your second or third choice school, you might as well go to one where they promise to have fun.
There is no doubt that more kids going to the school builds momentum, which eventually affects the city. Unfortunately, when a kid goes to school in Oxford, the parents are forced to go there at some point whether they want to or not. The more that happens, the better their restaurants do. The better their hotels do. The more condos they buy. The more crowded that gheyass square is. It may not be the main driving force, but it definitely helps the city.
Definitely it helps. But my primary point was that in the 20 year stretch Oxford grew they had a lower enrollment than us.
It’s been over 10 years since they were a D school district.
There are 4 categories for growth on the 1,000 point scale at 95 points each. ELA Growth (All students), ELA Growth (Lowest 25% of students), Math Growth (All students), and math growth (lowest 25% of students).
You can get away with showing growth for 1 year, but after that you have to continue to grow or you don’t get those points.
Actually, if you look at the data from the 22-23 school year and compare it to the 23-24 school year the only place Starkville didn’t get as many points was in a few of the growth categories, so your assertion that they are only a B due to growth, is incorrect.
Checkout the hotel prices at the Graduate for the OM/UGA weekend. $2,500 per night with a two night minimum. And they will be booked to capacity. This trend has been growing for a while now.
You would not believe the amount of tags from California, New Jersey, Connecticut, Illinois, etc. that are driving around Oxford and on OM's campus... if they are recruiting those areas well, Texas & Georgia, and then getting kids from state families in Mississippi... it's going to be a bad time for Mississippi State.
They have over 6,000 freshman this year and State only had 3,700 last year, so the gap is widening.
They are trouncing us in recruiting. They also have almost 100% acceptance rate. Which is what we should be doing. Ours is around 75%. But we have the capacity for more. They are doing a disservice to theirs. They had to ship some freshmen to apartments that gouged them.
I go to law school here and the parking is a disaster, the traffic flow is even worse.
But it's unreal how many more out of state students it is here than Mississippi people, and I'm not exaggerating either almost every tag is from the Northeast, Texas, or California.
Rarely is there going to be something that's good for the university and not for Starkville, unless you are talking about just transferring money from the school to the university. Starkville would be aspiring to be like Eupora if it wasn't for the university. The bunch of baptist blue haired *** hats in Starkville that were in denial of that are mainly what has held Starkville and MSU back.
actually its not. Starkville is getting improvement points that once they are gone, or once they cant improve anymore. It will settle back to a C school district.
The district in the blue in growth and thats all its blue in. They actually score insanely high in those numbers. Those numbers wont always be there and when they arent. You'll see them drop back to that C score.
When you are as low as they were... and they were very low 2-3 years ago. The improvement can and will take years to occur. So they are still scoring extremely well in the growth categories and thats whats carrying their scores.... as proof of this they are still below state average in every other scores-- Math, Science, English, History, and Graduation Rate--- so you tell me how can a school or district be B rated when their scores fall below the state average?
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The two IHLs that offer Hospitality Management degrees are Ole Miss and Southern Miss.
IHLs ain’t gonna approve a third program unless it’s Alcorn since it has campuses in Vicksburg and Natchez.
ETA: If I’m an Alcorn administrator, I’d get a program proposal started last week and offer at the very least concentrations in casinos and tourism.
Im not disagreeing with that. But shes gone all in on the university and that area and neglected other things that have been what makes starkville, starkville. I mean heck arent we a baseball town... we built Cornerstone 10 years to late. Things like that have happened on her watch. Shes a day late and a dollar short... all because shes trying to appease the university.
May as well give up on the school, it can't be changed. Schools generally start out the best they will ever be, then get worse over time. Once a school establishes itself as decent, everybody wants to go there, including the problems, and well, what goes in comes out. No school is inherently 'good' or 'bad', they are all products of the parents/students that attend.
I've yet to see one public school in Starkville's position that actually got better over time. You have some like Brandon who started out decent, and are now seeing the rise from becoming a growing Jackson suburb. But again....it was never below average like Starkville.
So, if you don't want to pay for Starkville Academy, better hope the kids can adjust to Starkville High and find their niche. Else East Webster gonna keep growing. But this isn't some sprawling urban area, so this really doesn't help Starkville all that much and prevents some needed growth.
Of course, my idealist mind tells me that there could be a group together that isn't scared of Starkville High, and bands together and keeps support high there. But I know that's delusional thinking. So my practical side says, accept that the public school situation is what it is, and Starkville Academy is where we need to invest. Heck, even in areas with strong public schools, you're seeing private schools pop up.
Best thing to do would be for parents to decouple their real estate choices from the public school systems. But I recognize this takes a shift in overall population thought, which happens slowly. People are waking up, though.
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This isn't really the Mississippi State mantra though. I think we should be branding ourselves a different way. I mean we are surrounded by party schools - Ole Miss, Bama, even USM.
It's still amazing to me that Starkville leadership managed to have a ****** public school system. Consolidation probably ended up being a bad thing too because whatever good it did, it's basically impossible to undo so they can't even naturally sort over time into a good school and bad school.
Past STarkville aldermen and mayors and oktibehha supervisors and whoever else fought so damn hard against progress need to be drug into the street and beaten.
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Wait.....you're constantly preaching consolidation on here.....now you're saying that Starkville doing it was a bad thing?
What are you expecting "leadership" to do? They can't help who lives in the area. I agree that they've held Starkville back in many ways, but the school was never one of them. Schools are what they are, like I said above.
Consolidation of districts, not schools. Lots of school districts have multiple bad schools and one good school. I don't know the lay of the land as far as where the different boundaries were and whether you could carve up the county into two high schools that made sense and also ensured one had enough affluent areas to be good, so it may not be any harder to do now than it was. But even a non-affluent area can have a good school if there is a way for involved parents to sort into one school district over another.
I think lots of areas are now seeing Consolidation as a bad thing. At the time I believe the state was dishing out large amounts of cash to districts willing to take on failing schools and Starkville was one of the first.
Leadership matters. Good admins can create good ties with the community and foster a better school. Just like a football coach, although he can recruit, its similar. Some schools always get 3 star talent and win more than others with 3 star talent that lose with it. Good leadership in schools can make that type of difference.
I gotcha. I guess that is a different deal. Generally you need to have enough enrollment to do that, else you'll get a Cleveland/East Side situation.
I agree, but like coaching, I think they can only do so much. At the end of the day, it's students in vs. students out. And if that's true about Starkville taking the money grab, then yeah, that was a horrible decision.
But back to your point @johnson86-1, one thing I just noticed.......Oxford and Lafayette County are like 2 miles away from each other. Lafayette's district surrounds Oxford. I know having County districts like that isn't abnormal, especially in MS, but the schools usually aren't right by each other. Or they are at least split up like East and West Oktibbeha once were. The demographics are the same too, to the desegregation leaves them alone. But still weird to have two schools that close. Why or why not have a big school? I have no preference, but you'd think Lafayette would at least be on the other side of town or something. Maybe split the County up in two. I'm sure there's some politics, like rich Oxford folks not wanting to go to school with country bumpkins.
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LSU isn't the only university that gets tons of people to their watch parties, at least from the SEC.
Once Danver's closed, the town went downhill.****
Starkville is missing city infrastructure &, due to this, city fees are extremely high. The city needs a bigger engine so it can grow & keep fees at a reasonable rate. The way Starkville handles building fees & taxes right now, it's almost like they don't want to grow.
That's true. Maybe that's why they aggressively pursued enrollment growth by the methods you mentioned, while we were sitting back satisfied because we were ahead... I'm not sure. But my original point was to agree with you that we need to have more people going to (and staying in) Starkville.
I was just trying to say that's easier to do - for parents, at least - if our children go to school here. We need to do everything we can to make the experience good and fun and memorable so kids don't easily get lured in by shiny objects elsewhere. Sometimes I worry that our leadership doesn't see it that way.
I don't know about right next to each other, but I don't think it's abnormal to have a county high school within a few miles of the city high school. Definitely not ideal for a planning perspective but I assume when they were located there it made some sense (or at least as much sense as it could considering you would often have a county school district completely surrounding a city one.
Lost me here.
Okay, what's the mantra - engineering? Going to be tough to build enrollment on that sales pitch. I'm not saying we try to be the same as anyone else. Maybe we do hit the point that our academics are better than OM (are they?) or whatever differentiators you can come up with. But the experience has to be fun and memorable so the current students will tell future students. And so when the current students graduate, they will want to come back and visit.
If we do stupid things like "encourage" our freshmen to not go out on the weekends, while kids at other schools are out having fun and putting every bit of it on instagram... well, that's just not going to lead to growth.
Desoto needed Lewisburg and Center Hill when they were built. Olive Branch, Southaven, Hernando, and Desoto Central were overcrowded.
Now, they're all overcrowded.
The marquee last weekend at the pony said "Now with 25% more hotties."
Well that's 24% more than the one time I was in there. A good dentist couldn't have found a full set of teeth that night.
I had some customers that were regulars and talked me in to meeting them there. I wouldn't have "hit it" that night if I was the only male left to re-populate the world
We certainly don't need to lean into a lack of fun (i.e. encourage students not to party). But we aren't going to win the party either.
I don't have the answer, just brainstorming. It would be nice if we had some sort of academia to hang our hat on. I don't know what does Oklahoma State/Kansas State/Iowa State do? Maybe some merger there between them and Auburn/Clemson/Texas A&M? Just looking for some substance here, rather than suburban fratting.
A hotel in the South endzone.
I don't know what to do with downtown/midtown/cotton district.
As in what to put where. Bigger cities/schools could fill all of that in with restaurants and bars and shops. Starkville might, if other places could relocate from Highway 12 and a parking garage is built.
What is there to do in Tuscaloosa? Baton Rouge? The great college town of Athens?
Is this referencing something that has actually happened? Or is this just a hypothetical?
They definitely need some sort of upscale hotel built and ran by the the university on campus.
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