A new Brookings Institution report on federal school enrollment data shows urban and suburban school districts across the country are faced with declining enrollments.
But Evanston Skokie School District 65’s enrollment drop of nearly 15% over the most recent four year period for which data is available is nearly three times the average decline for urban districts and nearly five times the average drop in suburban districts.
Enrollment drops lead to a decline in state funding and make it difficult to offer full programs at each school, but school districts have been slow to close schools in response to the enrollment declines — because, as a Wall Street Journal article noted earlier this month, the shutdowns prove extremely unpopular with parents of the children affected.
District 65, of course, while it is on the verge of voting to close one school, Bessie Rhodes, is also about to start construction of a new, larger, $48 million school in the 5th Ward.
Brookings research suggests that the decline in public school enrollment is “not fully explained” by changes in population, and charter or private school enrollment, suggesting “many families have chosen to homeschool after the pandemic.”
It also suggests, based on research in New York City, that parents are less satisfied with their local public schools now than they were before the pandemic.
Another national recent report indicate that schools with a higher proportion of minority students are more likely to be closed. And state school report card figures show that Bessie Rhodes has the highest percentage of minority students in District 65.
It also has the second-smallest total enrollment, according to the state school report card data, 275 students. The lowest enrollment school, Orrington, with 255 students, also has the highest proportion of non-Hispanic white students of any school in the district.
Both schools have lost students this school year. The administration, at Monday night’s board meeting, said Rhodes currently has 253 students while Orrington has 243.
While Bessie Rhodes is the only school identified for closure in District 65 so far, school board members are already talking about closing as many as two more schools in the future.