Student enrollment on Long Island falls 7% in decade
Setauket Elementary School in the Three Village school district. That district experienced a drop of 1,495 students, or 20.8%, in a decade, state figures show. Credit: Newsday
Student enrollment has declined in three out of four Long Island school districts over the past decade, as much as 25% in some, as schools grapple with families having fewer children, an aging population and people leaving who can't afford to live here, according to state figures and a Newsday analysis.
Of Long Island's 124 school districts, 94, or 76%, saw their student population drop from the 2012-13 school year to the 2022-23 school year, with some districts seeing substantial decreases, including Kings Park (-29%), Port Jefferson (-26%), West Hempstead (-23%), Smithtown (-22%) and Commack (-21%), according to the most recent figures from the state Department of Education.
In total, the Island's student population dropped by 33,394, or 7.33%, in the decade, from 455,384 to 421,990, the figures show.
The dwindling enrollment “is a result of declining birthrates, and Long Island attracting fewer movers from elsewhere in the United States than it had previously,” said Ken Girardin, research director at the Empire Center for Public Policy, a fiscally conservative think tank in Albany.
The enrollment reduction occurred during a period when the Island population actually increased, according to the latest census data. The population rose by 60,685, or 2.1%, from 2012 to 2022, to a total of 2.9 million.
Experts say the Island is aging overall, and that families are having fewer children.
The median age on the Island increased from 40.9 in 2012 to 41.8 in 2022, census figures showed. Nassau County's birthrate decreased from 10.6 per 1,000 people in 2010 to 9.9 in 2020, according to state figures. Suffolk's birthrate decreased from 11.3 to 10 in that time.
The Island is also experiencing many people moving away, due to, among other issues, the high cost of living here, the figures show. From 2021 to 2022, Nassau County lost 11,915 people and Suffolk County lost 12,128 due to domestic migration, according to Census Bureau figures.
Kings Park Superintendent Timothy Eagen said the Island's cost of living “makes it tough for young people. It's hard to keep young people here on Long Island.”
Suffolk County saw a far greater loss of students than Nassau did.
Suffolk lost 26,610 students in a decade, a drop of 10.5%. In Nassau, enrollment declined by 6,784, or 3.3%, according to state figures. The numbers include students from pre-K to 12th grade. Local planners speculated that Nassau lost fewer students due to the proximity to the city and job opportunities.
School enrollment, which has been dropping across the state, stands at the center of debate as lawmakers craft the new state budget. Gov. Kathy Hochul wants to eliminate the “hold harmless” policy over school aid. The policy, in existence for decades, has meant school districts could generally count on receiving as much state aid as they got in the previous year, even if they saw enrollment declines.
So even though many Island schools have seen their number of students dwindle, the districts have been essentially protected from drastic state cuts, Girardin said.
Hochul, who cited enrollment downturns in her plan, also has said school districts are sitting on hundreds of millions of dollars in reserve funds that could be tapped, instead of “hoarded,” to offset any state-aid reductions. Her plan has met resistance from school districts and both Democratic and Republican lawmakers, who say the cuts could mean teacher and staff layoffs.
State education aid can vary widely from district to district, depending on population, wealth, poverty and the local tax burden, Girardin said. The aid is coupled in school budgets with money raised through local taxes.
“The governor is trying to tame the growth of school aid, which is the second-largest part of the budget,” he said, noting that one quarter of all taxes and fees collected by the state go to school aid.
Some school districts are “swimming in cash, and the governor is correctly pointing that out,” Girardin said. “She's ripping off the Band-Aid. It [school aid] is not under control.”
Many Long Island school officials strongly disagree.
They assert that districts had to shift money for priorities such as greater mental health services — especially since the disruptions of the pandemic — as well as school security, and increases in special-needs students and those learning English as a second language.
“There's been an increase in student needs. Maybe they had a reduction in teachers but they needed more social workers,” said Bob Vecchio, executive director of the Nassau-Suffolk School Boards Association.
The governor's plan would mean less state assistance for 337 of the state’s 700-plus school districts — including 44 on Long Island. At least 77 Island districts would gain more than $182 million in state assistance under the proposal.
The state budget is due April 1, though it’s been late the last two years. Statewide, school voting day is May 21.
Several districts have been forced to close schools due to enrollment declines, including Northport-East Northport, Lindenhurst, West Islip, Mineola, Baldwin and North Bellmore, while others have decreased staff.
The Three Village district experienced a drop of 1,495 students, or 20.8%, in a decade, state figures show, and Superintendent Kevin Scanlon said he's seen the changes in his community. After the 2008 Great Recession, he said, he saw many older residents holding onto their homes as values decreased.
Rental homes in the area that once held families now are filled with students from Stony Brook University, he said.
The churn of incoming and outgoing students has changed the district's demographic profile, he said. Students in poverty rose from 4% to 14.5% of the student body over a decade. Students learning English as a second language rose from 1.5% to 2%, Hispanic students rose from 4% to 9%, and Asian students increased from 9% to 13%, he said.
The enrollment decline has prompted Three Village to reshuffle grades among its buildings to better spread the number of students, he said. The plan, which will occur in the 2025-26 school year, will move the sixth grade from the elementary schools to two junior highs, and move the ninth grade from the junior highs to the high school, he said.
Three Village had examined closing an elementary school due to the declining enrollment but chose not to because the state plans to increase prekindergarten, and the district may need the additional space, he said.
The Island's enrollment declines mirror the picture across the state. Enrollment in New York public schools this year sank to its lowest level since the early 1950s, according to a recent report by the Empire Center for Public Policy. Since 2011-12, the last year in which enrollment rose, the number of students in New York public schools dropped 320,209, or 11.9%, the center said.
The Center Moriches district saw a drop of 185 students, or 10.7%, according to state figures. Behind those numbers are some significant changes in the makeup of the student body, Superintendent Ron Masera said.
The percentage of white students in Center Moriches has dropped from about 80% to 70% in a decade, while the ratio of Hispanic students has nearly doubled, from 11% to 21%, he said. The Black student population has remained relatively stable at about 5%, he said.
The changes have driven up the percentage of students needing instruction in English as a second language, from 4% to 7%, and the percentage of economically disadvantaged students shot up from 18% to 29%, he said.
More than ever, schools are providing more services for mental health and disabled students, he said.
“It's not just local, this is national. The trend is going toward school-based mental health centers,” Masera said.
“Declining enrollment has been both a blessing and a curse,” said Eagen, the Kings Park superintendent.
That district has lost 1,104 students in the past decade, according to state figures. Eagen said that as soon as he was hired in 2014, he saw that the incoming kindergarten class was significantly smaller than the graduating class.
As enrollment declined in the elementary level, it freed up space that had been overcrowded and allowed for six more prekindergarten classes, he said.
Kings Park also has seen changes in the student body, he said. The number of children who qualify for free or reduced lunches has grown over the past decade from 8% to 16%. In that time, the district has added five teachers for students learning English as a second language, he said.
“While we have less students and less classroom teachers today, we have more support staff to address the learning and mental health needs of our students,” Eagen said. He noted the district has hired five additional social workers and a psychologist in the past decade.
Eagen said the enrollment decline has not impacted the quality of education. The district's AP programs have expanded, and the district offers more courses for college credit than a decade ago, he said.
“Some of the sports teams are smaller due to the declining enrollment, but we have not cut any programs,” he said.
Eagen said he sees enrollment leveling off to the point where this year's elementary class was about the same size as its graduating class.
State aid comprises about 20% of the school budget in Kings Park, with local taxes making up the rest, he said. If Hochul's proposed budget is approved by the State Legislature, the district would lose $850,000 in state aid, he said.
Eagen said local real estate agents tell him the housing market is very tight, and the number of homes on the market is low.
“There's not a lot of new families moving in,” he said.
In smaller districts, the loss of enrollment can be devastating.
In New Suffolk, the elementary-level student body dwindled from 14 in 2020-21, according to state figures, to six this year. The students attend classes in the district's three-room schoolhouse.
Residents will vote March 5 on a plan that would send all students to classes outside New Suffolk's boundaries on a tuition basis. The red schoolhouse would remain in use, possibly as a community center, officials said.
Looking ahead, the Island's student population is expected to continue its slow-but-steady decrease into 2025, dropping about 1.5% by then, according to a 2023 study by Western Suffolk BOCES.
A total of 30 Island districts saw their student body grow in number, some significantly, according to state figures. They include Wyandanch (24.9% increase), Central Islip (17%), East Meadow (9.7%), and Floral Park-Bellerose (8.6%).
Enrollment in the Brentwood school district, among the largest in the state with some 18,000 students, saw an increase of 675 students in a decade, a 3.7% bump.
Brentwood has seen transience among its students, which is not uncommon in areas with lower-income families, Superintendent Wanda Ortiz-Rivera said. Families move in and out due to work opportunities, she said.
Some of the enrollment increases came in prekindergarten students and immigrant students, she said. The percentage of Hispanic students has grown from 79% a decade ago to 87% now, she said.
The demographic shift has pushed the district to hire more bilingual educators as well as counselors, she said. The district also has set up food pantries at the high school and central administration building, she said.
Some of the immigrant students come to the district lacking basic language and education skills, she said.
“Our teachers work very hard to catch them up,” Ortiz-Rivera said.
With Michael Ebert, Arielle Martinez and Yancey Roy
Student enrollment has declined in three out of four Long Island school districts over the past decade, as much as 25% in some, as schools grapple with families having fewer children, an aging population and people leaving who can't afford to live here, according to state figures and a Newsday analysis.
Of Long Island's 124 school districts, 94, or 76%, saw their student population drop from the 2012-13 school year to the 2022-23 school year, with some districts seeing substantial decreases, including Kings Park (-29%), Port Jefferson (-26%), West Hempstead (-23%), Smithtown (-22%) and Commack (-21%), according to the most recent figures from the state Department of Education.
In total, the Island's student population dropped by 33,394, or 7.33%, in the decade, from 455,384 to 421,990, the figures show.
The dwindling enrollment “is a result of declining birthrates, and Long Island attracting fewer movers from elsewhere in the United States than it had previously,” said Ken Girardin, research director at the Empire Center for Public Policy, a fiscally conservative think tank in Albany.
WHAT TO KNOW
- Student enrollment has declined in three out of four Long Island school districts over the past decade.
- Schools are grappling with families having fewer children, an aging population and people leaving who can't afford to live here, according to state figures and analysis.
- School enrollment, which has been dropping across the state, stands at the center of debate as lawmakers craft the new state budget.
The enrollment reduction occurred during a period when the Island population actually increased, according to the latest census data. The population rose by 60,685, or 2.1%, from 2012 to 2022, to a total of 2.9 million.
Experts say the Island is aging overall, and that families are having fewer children.
The median age on the Island increased from 40.9 in 2012 to 41.8 in 2022, census figures showed. Nassau County's birthrate decreased from 10.6 per 1,000 people in 2010 to 9.9 in 2020, according to state figures. Suffolk's birthrate decreased from 11.3 to 10 in that time.
The Island is also experiencing many people moving away, due to, among other issues, the high cost of living here, the figures show. From 2021 to 2022, Nassau County lost 11,915 people and Suffolk County lost 12,128 due to domestic migration, according to Census Bureau figures.
Kings Park Superintendent Timothy Eagen said the Island's cost of living “makes it tough for young people. It's hard to keep young people here on Long Island.”
Suffolk County saw a far greater loss of students than Nassau did.
Suffolk lost 26,610 students in a decade, a drop of 10.5%. In Nassau, enrollment declined by 6,784, or 3.3%, according to state figures. The numbers include students from pre-K to 12th grade. Local planners speculated that Nassau lost fewer students due to the proximity to the city and job opportunities.
School enrollment, which has been dropping across the state, stands at the center of debate as lawmakers craft the new state budget. Gov. Kathy Hochul wants to eliminate the “hold harmless” policy over school aid. The policy, in existence for decades, has meant school districts could generally count on receiving as much state aid as they got in the previous year, even if they saw enrollment declines.
So even though many Island schools have seen their number of students dwindle, the districts have been essentially protected from drastic state cuts, Girardin said.
Hochul, who cited enrollment downturns in her plan, also has said school districts are sitting on hundreds of millions of dollars in reserve funds that could be tapped, instead of “hoarded,” to offset any state-aid reductions. Her plan has met resistance from school districts and both Democratic and Republican lawmakers, who say the cuts could mean teacher and staff layoffs.
State education aid can vary widely from district to district, depending on population, wealth, poverty and the local tax burden, Girardin said. The aid is coupled in school budgets with money raised through local taxes.
“The governor is trying to tame the growth of school aid, which is the second-largest part of the budget,” he said, noting that one quarter of all taxes and fees collected by the state go to school aid.
Some school districts are “swimming in cash, and the governor is correctly pointing that out,” Girardin said. “She's ripping off the Band-Aid. It [school aid] is not under control.”
Enrollment has declined 26% in the past decade in the Port Jefferson school district. Credit: Newsday/Steve Pfost
Many Long Island school officials strongly disagree.
They assert that districts had to shift money for priorities such as greater mental health services — especially since the disruptions of the pandemic — as well as school security, and increases in special-needs students and those learning English as a second language.
“There's been an increase in student needs. Maybe they had a reduction in teachers but they needed more social workers,” said Bob Vecchio, executive director of the Nassau-Suffolk School Boards Association.
The governor's plan would mean less state assistance for 337 of the state’s 700-plus school districts — including 44 on Long Island. At least 77 Island districts would gain more than $182 million in state assistance under the proposal.
The state budget is due April 1, though it’s been late the last two years. Statewide, school voting day is May 21.
Some districts have closed schools
Several districts have been forced to close schools due to enrollment declines, including Northport-East Northport, Lindenhurst, West Islip, Mineola, Baldwin and North Bellmore, while others have decreased staff.
The Three Village district experienced a drop of 1,495 students, or 20.8%, in a decade, state figures show, and Superintendent Kevin Scanlon said he's seen the changes in his community. After the 2008 Great Recession, he said, he saw many older residents holding onto their homes as values decreased.
Rental homes in the area that once held families now are filled with students from Stony Brook University, he said.
The churn of incoming and outgoing students has changed the district's demographic profile, he said. Students in poverty rose from 4% to 14.5% of the student body over a decade. Students learning English as a second language rose from 1.5% to 2%, Hispanic students rose from 4% to 9%, and Asian students increased from 9% to 13%, he said.
The enrollment decline has prompted Three Village to reshuffle grades among its buildings to better spread the number of students, he said. The plan, which will occur in the 2025-26 school year, will move the sixth grade from the elementary schools to two junior highs, and move the ninth grade from the junior highs to the high school, he said.
Three Village had examined closing an elementary school due to the declining enrollment but chose not to because the state plans to increase prekindergarten, and the district may need the additional space, he said.
The Island's enrollment declines mirror the picture across the state. Enrollment in New York public schools this year sank to its lowest level since the early 1950s, according to a recent report by the Empire Center for Public Policy. Since 2011-12, the last year in which enrollment rose, the number of students in New York public schools dropped 320,209, or 11.9%, the center said.
The Center Moriches district saw a drop of 185 students, or 10.7%, according to state figures. Behind those numbers are some significant changes in the makeup of the student body, Superintendent Ron Masera said.
The percentage of white students in Center Moriches has dropped from about 80% to 70% in a decade, while the ratio of Hispanic students has nearly doubled, from 11% to 21%, he said. The Black student population has remained relatively stable at about 5%, he said.
The changes have driven up the percentage of students needing instruction in English as a second language, from 4% to 7%, and the percentage of economically disadvantaged students shot up from 18% to 29%, he said.
More than ever, schools are providing more services for mental health and disabled students, he said.
“It's not just local, this is national. The trend is going toward school-based mental health centers,” Masera said.
'Blessing and a curse'
“Declining enrollment has been both a blessing and a curse,” said Eagen, the Kings Park superintendent.
That district has lost 1,104 students in the past decade, according to state figures. Eagen said that as soon as he was hired in 2014, he saw that the incoming kindergarten class was significantly smaller than the graduating class.
“It's hard to keep young people here on Long Island,” Kings Park Superintendent Timothy Eagen said. Credit: Barry Sloan
As enrollment declined in the elementary level, it freed up space that had been overcrowded and allowed for six more prekindergarten classes, he said.
Kings Park also has seen changes in the student body, he said. The number of children who qualify for free or reduced lunches has grown over the past decade from 8% to 16%. In that time, the district has added five teachers for students learning English as a second language, he said.
“While we have less students and less classroom teachers today, we have more support staff to address the learning and mental health needs of our students,” Eagen said. He noted the district has hired five additional social workers and a psychologist in the past decade.
Eagen said the enrollment decline has not impacted the quality of education. The district's AP programs have expanded, and the district offers more courses for college credit than a decade ago, he said.
“Some of the sports teams are smaller due to the declining enrollment, but we have not cut any programs,” he said.
Eagen said he sees enrollment leveling off to the point where this year's elementary class was about the same size as its graduating class.
State aid comprises about 20% of the school budget in Kings Park, with local taxes making up the rest, he said. If Hochul's proposed budget is approved by the State Legislature, the district would lose $850,000 in state aid, he said.
Eagen said local real estate agents tell him the housing market is very tight, and the number of homes on the market is low.
“There's not a lot of new families moving in,” he said.
In smaller districts, the loss of enrollment can be devastating.
In New Suffolk, the elementary-level student body dwindled from 14 in 2020-21, according to state figures, to six this year. The students attend classes in the district's three-room schoolhouse.
Residents will vote March 5 on a plan that would send all students to classes outside New Suffolk's boundaries on a tuition basis. The red schoolhouse would remain in use, possibly as a community center, officials said.
Looking ahead, the Island's student population is expected to continue its slow-but-steady decrease into 2025, dropping about 1.5% by then, according to a 2023 study by Western Suffolk BOCES.
Some districts have seen growth
A total of 30 Island districts saw their student body grow in number, some significantly, according to state figures. They include Wyandanch (24.9% increase), Central Islip (17%), East Meadow (9.7%), and Floral Park-Bellerose (8.6%).
Enrollment in the Brentwood school district, among the largest in the state with some 18,000 students, saw an increase of 675 students in a decade, a 3.7% bump.
Brentwood has seen transience among its students, which is not uncommon in areas with lower-income families, Superintendent Wanda Ortiz-Rivera said. Families move in and out due to work opportunities, she said.
Some of the enrollment increases came in prekindergarten students and immigrant students, she said. The percentage of Hispanic students has grown from 79% a decade ago to 87% now, she said.
The demographic shift has pushed the district to hire more bilingual educators as well as counselors, she said. The district also has set up food pantries at the high school and central administration building, she said.
Some of the immigrant students come to the district lacking basic language and education skills, she said.
“Our teachers work very hard to catch them up,” Ortiz-Rivera said.
With Michael Ebert, Arielle Martinez and Yancey Roy
Craig Schneider is a Long Island native and Stony Brook University alumnus. He joined Newsday as a general assignment reporter in January 2018 after 20 years at the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
