Jasper Winterton
Feature Editor
“I would say (public school enrollment declining) is a national issue, because now when I go to conferences we’re talking about marketing and branding when that’s never been an issue,” Dr. Jana Parker, superintendent, said.
The Webster Groves School District has been experiencing a decline in enrollment due to factors including senior property tax freezes, rhetoric surrounding public education and people remaining in the neighborhood. Along with the enrollment decline, the district faces a loss of $450,000 a year due to the property tax freeze.
Mayor Laura Arnold said, “When our seniors want to move out of their homes, they do not have many options in Webster Groves. As a result, they tend to stay longer in their houses. That means younger families with children do not have the opportunity to access homes in the school district.”
Mayor Arnold added that due to the cost of housing in Webster Groves, it is harder for young families to move to Webster even if there is housing available. She also said families are generally getting smaller, and due to that larger houses are more likely to hold fewer children now, meaning that the same housing stock is holding fewer potential students.
The declining enrollment is not unique to Webster Groves, as there have been reports of a decrease in public school students following COVID-19.
According to a K-12 Dive article, there was a 2.8% decrease nationwide in the number of public school students between 2019-2020 and 2024-2025, and a 0.3% decrease between the 2024-2025 school year and the year before.
The article also states, ”Due to enrollment declines, two distinct concerns about the quality of students’ educational experiences emerge. Students who exit public schools often move into settings that are less regulated and more variable in performance.”
Dr. Parker said, “Since COVID, it’s been difficult to recoup. There are a lot of variants for why students left. Some of it is homeschool, which is a newer thing around Missouri. Then you have parochial, so faith-based education, and then you have private schools, so (public education is) competing with those.”
A Brookings research article projected that public school enrollment will continue to decrease, with a census reporting a population of 54,737,335 students enrolled nationwide in 2021, and a predicted population of 48,955,000 in 2050, a 10.56% decrease.
The article also said, “At the same time, the pandemic-era shift may prove less durable than it appears: Homeschooling demands intense parental effort, and as more adults return to on-site work, some families may decide that public schools once again offer the most practical option.”
Dr. Parker added public education has been under attack nation-wide, and the district is focusing on marketing and branding to help with the enrollment decline.
“I feel so fortunate to be in Webster, because we are this isolated little pocket, and my job is to really protect that pocket and protect our students and our staff to enable us to move forward in ways that we know is best for everybody,” Dr. Parker said.
Dr. Parker said if the school needs to make cuts to help with the budget impacted by the enrollment, it will make cuts that will impact students the least.
“People are staying, which is a blessing and a curse, but then that leaves less opportunity for new families to come in,” Dr. Parker said.
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Jasper Winterton-Feature EditorThis will be Jasper Winterton’s third year on ECHO staff. He made several contributions while taking journalism class his freshman year. |
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