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Bryant Public Schools (or Bryant Public School District) is a public school district based in Bryant, Arkansas, United States. Since the 2010–11 school year, the school district provides early childhood, elementary and secondary education to more than 8,000 students in prekindergarten through grade 12 and employs more than 875 educators and staff at its schools and district offices. BPS encompasses 342.19 square miles (886.3 km) of land in Saline County.

It supports all portions of Bryant, Alexander, Avilla, Bauxite, Benton, Salem CDP, Shannon Hills, and Paron.

History

In the early 1970s, political aide Carol Rasco set up the public school system's psychological counseling services while she worked in the district.

On July 1, 2004 the Paron School District merged into the Bryant School District. Because the state government considered Paron an isolated rural area, it gave an additional $838,000 to the Bryant district. Due to low student populations and the resulting complications, the district closed Paron High School in 2006, and Paron Elementary School in 2015.

In 2011, Bryant School District and its high school were recognized in the AP District of the Year Awards program in the College Board's 2nd Annual Honor Roll that consisted of 367 U.S. public school districts (4 in Arkansas) that simultaneously achieved increases in access to AP® courses for a broader number of students and improved the rate at which their AP students earned scores of 3 or higher on an AP Exam.

Schools

High schools:

• Bryant High School, grades 10-12 located in Bryant
• Bryant Jr. High , grade 9 &8

Middle schools:

• Bryant Middle School, grades 6&7located in Bryant
• Bethel Middle School, grades 6&7 located in Alexander

In 2017, Bryant Public Schools announced a junior high school, which will be open in the 2019-20 school year to 8th through 9th graders.

Elementary schools:

• Bryant Elementary, prekindergarten through grade 5 located in Bryant
• Collegeville Elementary, kindergarten through grade 5 located in Bryant
• Robert L. Davis Elementary, kindergarten through grade 5 located in Alexander
• Hurricane Creek Elementary, kindergarten through grade 5 located in Benton
• Salem Elementary, kindergarten through grade 5 located in Bryant
• Springhill Elementary, kindergarten through grade 5 located in Alexander
• Hillfarm Elementary, kindergarten through grade 5 located in Bryant
• Parkway Elementary, kindergarten through grade 5 located in Parkway

Former schools

• Paron High School in Paron (Unincorporated area) - Acquired in 2004, closed in 2006
• Paron Elementary School in Paron (Unincorporated area) - Acquired in 2004. In 2015, the Bryant district voted to close Paron Elementary School. At the time it had about 75 students. Paron students were reassigned to Salem Elementary School.

Notable alumni

• Travis Wood - Current Professional baseball player for the Chicago Cubs
• Shane Broadway - Former Arkansas State Senator

Further reading

Maps of the district and predecessors

• 2004-2005 School District Map
• Map of Arkansas School Districts pre-July 1, 2004
• "Arkansas Department of Education school district maps, 1952-1954 Saline County, 1952-1954". Arkansas Digital Archives. Arkansas State Archives. (Download) - Includes the boundary of the Bryant district in the 1950s

References

1. ^ "Search for Public School Districts – District Detail for Bryant School District". National Center for Education Statistics. Institute of Education Sciences. Retrieved March 24, 2013.
2. "SCHOOL DISTRICT REFERENCE MAP (2010 CENSUS): Saline County, AR." U.S. Census Bureau. Retrieved on May 24, 2018. For Paron compare to the highway map.
3. "General Highway Map Saline County, Arkansas" (PDF). Arkansas Department of Transportation. Archived from the original (PDF) on January 26, 2021. Retrieved February 28, 2021. - See Paron on the map.
4. Radcliffe, Donnie (August 24, 1993). "CLINTON'S WINDOW ON THE HOME FRONT". Washington Post. ISSN 0190-8286. Retrieved July 28, 2018.
5. "ConsolidationAnnex_from_1983.xls." Arkansas Department of Education. Retrieved on May 23, 2018.
6. ^ "School Consolidation." Encyclopedia of Arkansas History and Culture. Retrieved on May 24, 2018.
7. ^ Mershon, Matt (April 21, 2015). "Bryant school board votes to cut $3 million, close Paron Elementary". KATV. Retrieved May 24, 2018.
8. "AP District of the Year Awards: 2nd Annual Honor Roll". College Board. November 1, 2011. Retrieved November 14, 2012.
9. "Bryant School Board votes to close Paron Elementary". The Saline Courier. Retrieved May 24, 2018.

External links

• Bryant Public Schools website
• Bryant Public Schools at the Wayback Machine (archive index)

• Education in Saline County, Arkansas
• School districts in Arkansas