Every spring high schools across the state of Missouri send an enrollment number to MSHSAA (current 9th, 10th, and 11th grade students). With that number mshsaa places schools in classifications, based on size for state competition.
Dese collects data from school districts across the state of Missouri, one of which is enrollment data taken in the spring.
Logically speaking… if you add up the 9th, 10th, and 11th grade spring 2023 dese enrollments of a school, it should be very close to the 2023-2024 mshsaa # .
Most of them are. 2 high schools stand out amongst all others, one of which is Jeff City High School.
Spring 2023 Dese enrollment for grades 9-11 (1045)
2023-2024 MSHSAA# (896)
A difference of 149 students.
Jeff city was then placed in C4 (the cutoff for football being 906)
On average ive found that this difference is anywhere from 1 -25, but mostly around 10.
Jeff City competed and won a district championship against pleasant hill (MSHSAA# 535 / Dese enrollment 545)
They are currently in the MSHSAA playoffs playing Friday night against McDonald County (mshsaa#818 / Dese enrollment 825).
Today if you were to check enrollments on the MSHSAA website… Jefferson City’s mshsaa# is now 961 (still a difference of 84, but ok). There were 6 public high schools with a lower MSHSAA# than 961 that competed in C5 this season.
The MSHSAA website shows that the enrollments of schools competing in C4 in 2023 range from 512-906.
Why is a school with a C5 enrollment allowed to compete in the C4 playoffs?