Several area schools have seen increases in enrollment during the first days of classes, said area administrators.

Minot Public Schools Supt. David Looysen said he won't know how many students are enrolled until this afternoon, when all the students on the first day of classes have been counted, but it looks like there's a slight increase in kindergartners in the district.

In the Towner-Granville-Upham district, superintendent Debby Marshall said there are slight increases at both schools. TGU-Granville is up five students and TGU-Towner is up three students. Those are good numbers for a small school district, she said.

"We were anticipating a slight decline," she said.

Des Lacs-Burlington has seen a bump upwards in student numbers, going from 391 last year to 418 on the first day of school last week.

"We did add a third section of kindergarten," said superintendent Clarke Ranum, who said the biggest increase has been seen in the lower elementary grades. The district has added three new staff members at the elementary level to accommodate the increase.

Ranum said the increase may be due to several factors, such as the relatively strong economy and new housing developments going up in the district. Ranum said DL-B used to have the advantage of having lower priced housing than Minot, but has lost that advantage recently since houses in the district now cost about as much as Minot housing. There's still new housing going up, though, he said.

Duane Mueller, superintendent at Kenmare, said enrollment is also up in his area by about 10 or 12 students. In Kenmare, the increase is likely due to additional border security moving to the area, he said.

Student numbers in Bottineau have gone down slightly from last year, said superintendent Jason Kersten, but enrollment at the elementary has actually increased. Kersten said Bottineau High had large graduating classes the last few years and he was anticipating a decline once they had moved on. The high school has 242 students, down from 281 last year; the middle school has 75 students, down from 96 last year; and the elementary has 282 students, up from 273 last year.

Minot Public School students start classes today, but many area schools started classes last week or earlier this week.