Enrollment drop to force closing of many California schools

Between 20-plus years of plunging birth rates and, more recently, the historically unprecedented fact that more Americans are now moving out of California than into it, state demographics are changing profoundly. This is why the Golden State lost 800,000 in population in the three-year period ending in January. It’s also why public school enrollment declined every year from 2016 through 2023. This fall, 5.8 million students are enrolled in K-12 schools, down from the high of 6.3 million in 2004-05. State forecasters expect the number to keep dropping to under 5.4 million students in 2030.

Since funding is pegged under state law to average daily student counts in each school, districts of all sizes will be forced — eventually — to decide which of the more than 10,000 public schools in California need to be closed. With education dollars perpetually stretched thin, many schools will have to be shuttered on basic budget necessity grounds. But there is little evidence at the local or state level that enough is being done to prepare for this fraught future.

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