Though enrollment in K-12 private schools continued to climb for a fourth year, momentum is slowing, according to the Cato Institute’s July report Survey: Is the Private School Enrollment Boom Ending?, which highlights enrollment trends between the 2023–24 and 2024–25 academic years.
The public policy research organization chalks this up to potential factors, including “individuals seeking education consistent with their values pushing enrollment upward, and concerns about the cost of private education holding it down.”
The report summarizes the results of the Cato Institute’s 2024 Private School Enrollment Survey, which found that 40 percent of participating private schools saw enrollment increases during the period considered, while 32 percent experienced decreases and 28 percent indicated no change.
During the pandemic, when most public schools closed campuses and were cautious about reopening, private schools tended to resume normal operations more quickly, which some families preferred. “Since then, we have also seen a major expansion of private school choice programs, with enrollment through such programs now exceeding 1 million students,” according to the report.
During the pandemic, 53 percent of private schools saw enrollment increases, and of those, 65 percent maintained the increase in enrollment as the public health crisis subsided. Thirty-five percent reported experiencing a decline following the initial jump in enrollment.
As the pandemic recedes in the rearview, it has become “less likely to be an explanation for growth” in private schools, according to the report, crediting differences in values being a major reason in many states.
“Many schools reported that a primary reason for increased enrollment at their school was that the values of the school and parents were aligned. Other commonly cited drivers of increasing enrollment were academic concerns and religion,” according to the report. “Many schools whose enrollment declined reported that tuition affordability, often linked to competition from district and charter public schools as well as other private schools, was a top factor.”
The report points out that enrollment could have been higher, as 42 percent of private schools in the 2024 survey received more applications than the previous year; however, 39 percent of respondents had more applicants than available spaces.
