JAY – High school students have chosen their classes for next year, and 27 of those classes would have less than 10 students in them.

School Committee has a policy that outlines guidelines, teaching load and course enrollments and states that a minimum of 10 students be enrolled in classes at the high school. Special education class guidelines are handled in a separate policy.

Instead of taking action on a request for the committee to let the high school offer the 27 classes with less than 10 students, the board formed an ad-hoc committee led by Vice Chairman Mary Redmond-Luce to review the classes to determine if any with low numbers could be combined to be taught together or taught in a different manner.

Student committee member Justin Shink volunteered to serve on the committee, which will also include Principal John Robinson and Superintendent Robert Wall among others

School officials know that some classes will not be able to meet the enrollment numbers but would still need to be offered, such as advanced placement courses that earn students college credits.

“These numbers represent student choices. Nothing has been scheduled yet,” Robinson told committee members Thursday. Some students have not turned their course request list in yet, he said.

Administrators need to know which classes they will be able to offer, he said.

The classes with the least amount of students include Everyday Math with four students, math I and business math with seven students, economics with five students, career English with five students, writing about literature with four students and advanced placement calculus with three-plus students.

French III and French IV have four and five students, respectively, and Spanish IV has seven students.

Redmund-Luce said statistically students drop out of school because they’re not engaged and cannot see at the freshmen level how a course they are taking relates to their future.

The way the core subjects are set at the school in 80-minute classes, it does not always let students participate in electives, Redmond-Luce said.

Concerns raised included substituting virtual course work to be taught by a teacher at another school system and combining some classes, such as French III and French IV and what the teacher would do with free time created when she is not teaching two separate courses.