NORTHFIELD — With the district continuing its focus on long-term stability, Pioneer Valley Regional School’s administration launched a project this year to bolster eighth grade student retention.

Presenting to the School Committee Thursday evening, first-year Principal Matt Sullivan outlined the goals of the discussion-based project, which involves reaching out to eighth grade families, as well as having small, group-based conversations between students and administrators.

“A lot of eighth grade students transfer out of PVRS [ahead of their freshman year] in numbers higher than we’d like, and we’ve decided to embark upon a systematic review of this process to try and determine why that’s the case,” he said. “Listening and learning is the name of the game.”

Thursday night was not the first time Pioneer has discussed its incoming freshman class size. Prior to the start of the 2022-2023 school year, the School Committee and Superintendent Patricia Kinsella talked about the freshman class of just 19 students, which coincided with an out-of-district transfer rate of 64% — the highest transfer rate since the 2014-2015 school year.

Of the students who transferred out in 2022, more than half of them enrolled at Franklin County Technical School, which Pioneer School Committee member Stephen Martin said at the time isn’t necessarily a bad thing because it may be the right place for those students.

“If each of these 31 children going to Tech have a calling for that school, then for those students that is a good outcome,” Martin said in July 2022. “I’m cautioning us about this being right or wrong, bad or good, but have students found their place and fit for ninth grade?”

Kinsella said Pioneer has 60 ninth grade students this year, with an out-of-district transfer rate of 55%, and she is looking forward to more students and families choosing to stay in the district.

This is the first time, in Sullivan’s estimation, the district has undertaken this sort of review and he is hopeful it leads to an action plan. At this point, they’ve reached out to all eighth grade families and have talked with about 40 of them.

Sullivan said administrators are also holding conversations with students and asking them basic questions, such as how their year is going, what they like about the school and what their plans for next year are, to “get a real feel of what’s going on in the school.”

“We’re learning a lot in the process. … The kids we have in our school are awesome,” Sullivan said. “I do believe this project is going to bear fruit. … This is going to definitely inform the decisions we make moving forward.”

School Committee member Michele Giarusso asked Sullivan if there were any common themes developing, but he said they’re still analyzing some of the data they’ve collected and will have a more in-depth presentation in January.

“There’s been a lot of support from parents and families, and high interest in participating in this project,” he said. “People want to have their voices heard.”

Chris Larabee can be reached at clarabee@recorder.com or 413-930-4081.