Public school enrollment is declining in North Carolina, nationwide, amid alt schooling boom

New data reveals the number of North Carolina children being educated outside traditional public schools has nearly doubled over the last decade.

In 2013, just 252,000 students in the state attended either a charter, private or home school. Now, 420,000 have opted out of government-run schools.

During the same period, the K-12 public school population has declined by 8.5% (more than 64,000 students).

These changes aren’t only happening in North Carolina.  

States like New York, Washington, Minnesota and Michigan are all being forced to close public schools due to low enrollment. 

Meanwhile, charter schools are exploding in places like Idaho and Georgia. 

Declines in enrollment are also expected in coming years as declining birth rates shrink the pool of future students. 

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the current generation under five years old is 18.3 million. Comparatively, other groups of a five-year age span generally have 20-23 million people. 

Current elementary students (5 to 9 year olds) number 19.7 million. 

That means – without factoring in immigration – by 2029, America’s school-age population will have shrunk by at least 1.4 million students, averaging 28,000 per state or the equivalent of 7.5 public school districts. 

Those losses are likely to be most felt in states where students have more freedom to leave underperforming public schools. 

North Carolina – and nine other states – passed universal school choice programs that give students the funds to attend non-government-run schools.  

The new programs have received thousands of applications. Arkansas approved 5,000 scholarships for the first year, Iowa received over 7,000 applications in just one day, and Oklahoma got 30,000 applicants in less than two hours. 

And states with long-standing choice programs are also flourishing. Florida has over 345,000 families enrolled in various education freedom programs, and Wisconsin’s five programs serve a total of 87,359 students.