School Enrollment Is Dropping For The Second Straight Year

The troubling school enrollment losses that districts reported last year have continued this fall as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to disrupt public education across the country, an NPR investigation has found. They compiled the latest headcount data directly from more than 600 districts in 23 states and Washington, D.C., including statewide data from Massachusetts, Georgia, and Alabama. They found that very few districts, especially larger ones, have returned to pre-pandemic numbers, and most are now posting a second straight year of declines.

This is particularly true in some of the nation’s largest systems. New York City’s school enrollment dropped by about 38,000 students last school year and another 13,000 this year. In Los Angeles, the student population declined by 17,000 students last school year, and nearly 9,000 this year, and enrollment dropped by 14,000 last year in Chicago public schools, followed by another 10,000 this year.

In 2019-2020, public school enrollment dropped by 3 percent nationwide, erasing a decade of slow gains. The decline was attributed largely to COVID-related disruptions, and was concentrated in the early grades. Many families simply opted out of remote learning in the non-compulsory grades of pre-K and kindergarten. Educators and researchers NPR spoke with gave several possible explanations for the continuing falloff: an increase in home-schooling, a shift to charter schools and private schools, another year of delays in entering pre-K or kindergarten, and families moving to enroll in districts that weren’t captured in the sample.

Educators are most worried, however, about vulnerable students who may have fallen through the cracks in the widespread economic and social disruption caused by the pandemic.

“We think we found most of them, but there are still probably a thousand kids out there, we just don’t know what happened to them,” says Dallas Superintendent Michael Hinojosa. “Other urban superintendents are telling me they have significantly higher numbers of students that they’re really worried about.”

Below are some of the enrollment trends NPR found this year, and what they say about the pandemic’s lingering impact on education.

1. Some of the youngest students still have not enrolled. Between the fall of 2019 and the fall of 2020, federal data found a remarkable 13 percent drop in pre-K and kindergarten enrollment. Districts hoped to see many of these children arrive this fall. In Champlain Valley, Vermont’s largest school district, enrollment hasn’t returned to pre-pandemic levels, but the schools are seeing a kindergarten bump this fall.

2. Some families are shifting to private schools. Private and parochial schools generally enroll about 10 percent of all students in the United States, or about 5.7 million students. While nationwide enrollment in private schools dropped last year along with public schools, this year it has rebounded. The National Association of Independent Schools comprises private, non-parochial schools. They report a net enrollment growth of 1.7% over the two pandemic years.

3. Some families are shifting to charter schools. In the fall of 2020, charter schools, which are publicly funded but run separately from districts, saw a 7 percent jump in enrollment, adding about 240,000 students nationwide. “It translated to the single highest year, in terms of raw numbers, that we’ve ever seen charter schools grow,” says Debbie Veney at the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools. This figure included a big jump at virtual charter schools — a controversial, largely for-profit sector. In New York City, the KIPP charter school network opened three new schools this fall, fueling an enrollment jump of 11 percent. In fact, KIPP schools in the city grew during both pandemic years, to a total of 7,150 students.

4. Homeschooling is up, too. Public schools face competition not just from charters and private schools, but from families who have chosen to keep their kids home another year. A rise in remote work, and the experience of managing students’ virtual learning, may have made more families take a serious look at teaching their children at home. Yet homeschooling oversight varies widely from state to state. Errick Greene, the superintendent of the Jackson, Miss., public schools, worries about “bootleg homeschooling” — families that may be keeping children at home, but not necessarily giving them a thorough education. Mississippi has no testing requirements, no teacher qualifications and no mandated subjects for homeschooled students.

5. Some parents think there should be more remote options. In Rochester, the district’s homeschooling numbers are still above average, “because we are limiting the remote options this year,” says Myers-Small. “And we recognize and honor the fact that it might be concerning or scary” for some parents to send their children back to school at this point, especially with fresh fears around the Omicron variant. Tanesha Grant, the founder of Parents Supporting Parents New York City, represents a group of about 250 families who, she says, were “traumatized” by the pandemic. They are keeping their kids home from public school, but not officially removing them from the district. They call themselves “school strikers,” holding out for a permanent remote option because they don’t see school as safe. “Black and brown families we know are disproportionately affected and have had someone die or have COVID-19 in their families,” Grant says. “We live in multigenerational homes. We are still in mourning and still traumatized.”

6. Lingering concerns about COVID rules and enforcement remain. COVID safety protocols have been polarizing and politicized in this country, and that is keeping a vocal minority of parents away from public schools. Dean says parents’ frustrations over masking requirements showed up in surveys of families who have opted out of public school. Goldhardt, in Manchester, also saw students leave for private schools with looser COVID rules. “They didn’t require masking … and we did.”

7. High school students are dropping out to work. Students opting out for charters, private schools or homeschooling can hurt public schools because their funding is based on headcount. For the moment, federal relief funds may cover for revenue lost to enrollment drops, but that money is designed to phase out in several years. Superintendents also say they are often losing students to paid jobs. In Dallas, educators are trying to help working students by offering night school. “It has become popular because now these kids have started making some money, and their families depend on them,” says Superintendent Hinojosa. “And they don’t want to give up their jobs. And so we had to find a different way to meet their needs.”

Superintendents across the country tell NPR the pandemic pushed many families to think more deeply about each child’s education — what they need and how best to get it.

Allison Green
Boston Tutoring Services