Districts have lost track of thousands of students who left public schools since the pandemic began, and it is unclear how many of them are truant or unreported home-schoolers, according to a new study.
An analysis of enrollment data conducted by Stanford University in collaboration with the Associated Press found that there were no records last school year for more than 240,000 school-age children living in 21 states and the District of Columbia, which provided recent enrollment details.
Nationwide, public-school enrollment in kindergarten through grade 12 fell by roughly 1.2 million students between fall 2019 and fall 2021, according to the study’s analysis of Education Department data.
The study published this week sought to find out where students who left public schools went, and the degree to which changes in demographics and new schooling choices by families may account for the enrollment decline.
An estimated 26% of children who left public schools during the first two years of the pandemic switched to home-schools, the research found.
Private-school enrollment grew less, climbing 4% higher from the 2019-20 school year to the 2021-22 school year, while home-school enrollment jumped by 30%, according to the study by Thomas S. Dee, a Stanford University professor who specializes in the economics of education.