Last summer, we published an article all about private school vs. public school enrollment. More than ever, this has become a topical conversation over the last year. Many news articles are pointing to families favoring private school—or even homeschool—over public school educations after a year of virtual learning.
Nationwide, enrollment rates are increasing for private school education. Increasingly, parents are preferring private schools, mostly due to the ability to control more aspects of their children’s education, including whether or not classes are in person or virtual, and what the children are taught. Single parents are also finding a way, if possible, to move their children to a school that is in-person instead of remote, as they are at work during the day and can’t help with virtual schoolwork. From our data, we know that the highest percentage of private school aged children are those that are in preschool and pre-kindergarten, as many areas do not offer a public option. Just over 40% of Pre-K children nationwide attend a private school. From there, it goes down significantly, though year over year, it appears that those rates are rising.
So, why does it matter to you? More families in private schools means that, for many families, discretionary spending is going down in order to pay for expensive private school costs. Families that have moved to homeschool instead of public school could affect businesses in different ways. In some households, that could mean that one parent left the workforce in order to stay home with the children. In other cases, a stay at home parent is now also the teacher, and could be looking for daytime activities to do with their children, bringing more foot traffic to museums, parks and restaurants during the day.
Below are links to recent articles that discuss this growing trend.
During Covid, more families switch to private school from public (cnbc.com)
How Covid-19 Boosted Private School Enrollment Forever (forbes.com)
REPORT: Record-Breaking Education Exodus in Indiana — Chalkboard Review (thechalkboardreview.com)
Public and Private Schools Saw Enrollment Decline » Urban Milwaukee
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