Enrollment in Henrico's public schools continues to slump

Enrollment in Henrico Schools took a nosedive last year as the COVID-19 pandemic caused monumental disruptions to education.

In September, schools fully reopened and welcomed students back — most of whom hadn’t been inside of a school building in more than 500 days. School officials projected enrollment to bounce back and surpass the pre-pandemic enrollment of fall 2019.

But this fall’s projections were the most off they’ve been in at least 10 years.

While the projected enrollment was 50,486, the actual number of students who returned to Henrico schools this fall was 48,702 — even lower than last fall’s 48,982 figure.

Enrollment is down 3.8% down from 50,406 students in 2019, the last fall membership count before the onset of the pandemic. HCPS does not track reasons why students have left, according to Eileen Cox, Henrico County Public Schools spokeswoman.

As of last week, 1,273 students are being home schooled — a decrease of 183 students from last year from last year, according to Cox.

“It’s understandable that with the ongoing pandemic and availability of the vaccine for younger students coming just recently that is contributing to our enrollment being down,” Cox said. “Coming out of the pandemic. . . we’re hopeful that our students are going to be coming back. That’s what we anticipate.”

The greatest variations between projected and actual enrollment were at the elementary school level. The projected enrollment was 22,506 students, but the actual figure was more than 2,000 children off, at 20,268.

Projected enrollment is primarily calculated using birth rates as well as enrollment progression ratios. Because 2020-2021 had similar birth rates to previous years, kindergarten’s projected enrollment was bumped up to include students who were redshirted (the practice of delaying for a year a child’s entry into kindergarten) last year, according to a former HCPS spokesman. The same was done to first grade projection figures.

Enrollment for first-graders slumped this fall to 3,222 students, an 8.6% decrease from last fall. Meanwhile, enrollment for kindergarten increased by 7.9%, which could indicate that parents are redshirting their kindergartners.

Neither HCPS nor the state department of education tracks how many children are redshirted.

Historically, those who redshirt their kids are white, well-heeled parents with sons, according to most research studies. Redshirting often is an option only available to some because it requires parents to pay for an additional year of preschool tuition — which in some cases can cost as much as a year of college tuition.

The Three Chopt District saw the largest spike in kindergarten enrollment this fall, with a 13.9% increase from last year. Meanwhile, first grade enrollment in Three Chopt decreased by 5.5%.

Tuckahoe had the second-largest uptick in kindergarteners, with a 10.4% increase in this fall’s enrollment. First grade enrollment decreased by 3.2%.

In Varina, kindergarten enrollment saw a 6.2% increase while first grade enrollment decreased by 8.8%.

The Brookland and Fairfield districts both saw a slight decrease in kindergarten enrollment this fall year-over, 0.3% and 1.2% respectively. Like the other three districts, first grade enrollment also dropped, by 12.1% for Brookland and 13.7% for Fairfield.

With 3,329 kindergartners, enrollment has risen by 7.9% division-wide since 2020, but it still didn't hit the school division’s projection of 3,668.

Now is the time when school officials are analyzing the enrollment data. Sometime this winter, officials will release the projections for next fall.

Most of Virginia’s funding for K-12 schools is provided on a per-pupil basis, so a drop in enrollment usually would result in less money flowing down from the state.

But due to the pandemic’s impact on enrollment statewide, the current biennial budget includes enrollment no loss funding for both FY21 and FY22 to hold school divisions harmless for temporary declines in enrollment.

Correction: A previous version of this story incorrectly reported an increase of homeschooled students. There are 183 previously homeschooled students who re-enrolled in HCPS this fall.

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Anna Bryson is the Henrico Citizen's education reporter and a Report for America corps member. Make a tax-deductible donation to support her work, and RFA will match it dollar for dollar.