Paris High School

Paris High School, a small secondary school in Paris, Kentucky, one of the schools within Paris Independent, serves 267 students, covering grades 9 through 12. That puts it 52% smaller than the typical public school in Kentucky, which averages around 558 students.

Paris Independent comprises 4 schools with combined enrollment of 859 students; Paris High School is among them.

In terms of who attends, Paris High School reports that the most-represented group is White (46%), with the rest of the student body spread across multiple groups; the rest reads as 22% Black, 18% Hispanic, 13% multiracial. The wider county runs roughly 85% White, putting the school's mix meaningfully less White than the area baseline.

On the resource side, Staff filings list 15.3 full-time-equivalent teachers, which works out to roughly 17.5:1 students per teacher. The average for high schools in Kentucky is 16.6:1, so this school has more students per teacher. Roughly 79% of students at Paris High School qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, a commonly cited indicator of low-income enrollment. Set against Bourbon County (around 66%), the school's rate is above typical.

With demographic context factored in, Paris High School sits in the middle band of the BeatsExpectations distribution. Schools with this school's student mix typically land near 35.6%; this one delivers 24.3%.

In the area at large, community-level numbers for Bourbon County indicate median household earnings sit near $61,354, 26% of adults hold a bachelor's degree or higher, and census figures put the poverty rate at about 10%. In all, Bourbon County runs 10 public schools (combined enrollment of about 3,416 students), of which Paris High School is one.

The closest other public school is Paris Middle School, less than a tenth of a mile away. Counting just inside five miles, 8 other public schools cluster around Paris High School. On composite proficiency, Paris High School comes 7th of 7 in the immediate cluster, beneath the nearby-schools average of 30.7%.

The school occupies a small-town site.

Looking back 7 years, enrollment at Paris High School has climbed 35%, going from 198 students in 2017-18 to 267 in 2024-25. The White share of enrollment decreased from 52% to 46% over that span. Students per teacher rose from 12.3 in 2017-18 to 17.5 in 2024-25.

In the discussion threads here, the feed for Paris High School typically covers classroom updates, athletics, and weather closures. The community welcomes input from current and former families.