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Urban Schools in the US Plummeting with Enrollment
Education plays an important role in our life. However, urban schools in the US do not take this role seriously. Even though the education of the country is in a state of nosedive, urban schools still have nothing to deliver on their behalf.
Currently, there is a huge drop in enrollment. Not only that, the ones who are still enrolled are also chronically absent. This has raised a significant concern among the teachers, administrators, and parents. Some say that there are certain complicated reasons behind it.
It all started when the dreading wave of COVID-19 hit our way. The public schools almost lost more than a million students from the fall of 2019 to 2020. NCES says that enrollment rates hence fell from 50.8 million to 49.4 million.
It’s crucial that this doesn’t occur very frequently in the high poverty areas and other urban centers during the COVID-19.
However, after that year, there came in substantial decline in the public schools during 2020-2022. A recent study analyzed that this significant change was one of the pandemic’s downsides that left everyone astray.
Before the pandemic, the decline was only around 5-6%. However, the post-COVID-19 era decline was much more drastic. A huge decline came into being and they even continued to be out of the school even after the pandemic.
Coming to the most striking part, the balance between the students attending schools was anyways high. However, the increase in chronic absenteeism would amaze you. It doubled to 66% from 26% within the span of 2017 to 2022.
The pattern is still at its peak and it’s now radically declining. To be honest, there is no coming back from this.
However, some states are fighting back with such adversities. They have reported a 3% decrease in chronicle absenteeism in the year 2024-2025 compared to previous years
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