OCHS Journalism Students Publish April Edition of The Hoot Newsletter

In a county where more than half of residents under age 18 live below the poverty line, the journalism students at Owsley County High School published the April edition of The Hoot on April 6, with the Owsley County Schools official account sharing the newsletter publicly for community access.

Mrs. Carrie Smith's journalism class produces The Hoot at OCHS, the only high school in Owsley County, located in Booneville in the Eastern Coalfield region of Appalachian Kentucky. The school serves approximately 317 students in grades 6 through 12, 98 percent of whom are classified as economically disadvantaged, one of the highest rates among any high school in Kentucky.

The publication lands in a county with few competing sources of original local content. Owsley County's population stood at 4,051 as of the 2020 census, making it the second-least populous county in Kentucky, and its median household income of approximately $22,188 ranks near the bottom of all 3,222 counties nationwide. The county's poverty rate, between 24 and 36 percent, runs more than double the national average of 12.4 percent, and unemployment sits at 12.6 percent.

That context is not backdrop; it is the condition under which these students are writing, editing, and publishing. In a county where commercial media infrastructure is sparse, the district's own channels serve as a primary distribution network for local information. Owsley County Schools has consistently used digital tools to extend its reach, launching a 1:1 student device initiative in the 2015-2016 school year and building remote-instruction capacity years before it became a national necessity.

The district spends $16,007 per student annually and maintains a 12:1 student-to-teacher ratio with a fully licensed teaching staff, a resource profile that makes elective programming like journalism a deliberate institutional choice rather than a given.

The Hoot's name fits the school's owl-themed identity, and the district's decision to circulate each edition through official channels reflects the role Owsley County Schools plays beyond academics in a rural Appalachian community. For students whose county ranks near the bottom of nearly every economic measure, publishing a newsletter is also an act of civic presence.