Source: Brookings, “Conservation of Enrollment in State School”, August 2025.
Apartment for enrollment of private schools
Prior to the pandemic, the share of students in traditional public schools was stable, moving nearly 85 percent between 2016 and 2020. After the pandemic, traditional enrollment in public schools fell to less than 80 percent and did not recover.
The mysterious missing children represent much of the decline. But families also switched to charter and virtual schools. Enrollment in the charter school increased from 5 percent of students in 2016-17 to 6 percent in 2023-24. The number of children attending virtual schools has almost doubled from 0.7 percent before the pandemic in 2019-20 to 1.2 percent in 2020-21 and remains increased.
Surprisingly, the enrollment of private schools has remained steadily at almost 9 percent of children in school age between 2016-17 and 2023-24, according to this assessment of Brukings.
I expected the enrollment of private schools to jump, as families were destroyed by interruptions of public schools during the pandemic and as 11 states, including Arizona and Florida, launched their own educational savings account or new voucher programs to help pay the training. But Another analysisIssued this month by researchers at the University of Tulan, the Brookings numbers sounded. He found that private records of private schools increased by only 3 to 4 percent between 2021 and 2024, compared to countries without vouchers. A A new federal tax credit For the financing of private school scholarships, it is still more than a year since the entry into force on January 1, 2027 and may still be a more transition to private education.
Defects from traditional public schools are the largest in areas of black and with high poverty
I would assume that the more wealthy families who can afford private school education is more likely to look for alternatives. But the high poverty areas had the largest share of students outside the traditional public school sector. In addition to the private school, they were enrolled in charters, virtual schools, specialized schools for students with disabilities or other alternative schools or were home schools.
More than 1 in 4 students in high poverty areas are not enrolled in a traditional public school, compared to 1 in 6 students in low poverty schools. The largest losses for enrollment in public schools are concentrated in predominantly black schools. One third of students in predominantly black regions are not in traditional public schools, double the share of white and Spanish students.
A share of enrollment of students outside the traditional public schools in the field of poverty
Source: Brookings, “Conservation of Enrollment in State School”, August 2025.
A share of students not enrolled in traditional state schools in race and ethnicity
Source: Brookings, “Conservation of Enrollment in State School”, August 2025.
These discrepancies are important for students who remain in traditional public schools. Schools in low-income and black neighborhoods are already losing the most students, forcing even steeper budget cuts.
The demographic time bomb
Before the pandemic, American schools had already turned to a great contraction. The average American woman now gives birth to only 1.7 children throughout her life, well below the fertility rate 2.1 needed to replace the population. It is envisaged that the fertility rate will fall more. Brukings analysts accept that more immigrants will continue to enter the country, despite current immigration restrictions, but are not sufficient to compensate for the decline in births.
Even if families return to their models of recording before papandmia, the population decline will mean 2.2 million students in public schools by 2050. But if parents continue to choose other types of schools in the pace, observed after 2020, they can lose only 8.5 million students from 43, twisted from 43, shrinking from 43 the middle of the substance.
Among the students disappeared, the elections some black families and families in high poverty areas make and how many children are born, the landscape of public schools is shifting. Get late and get ready for liturgy Closure of public schoolsS
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