MCPS Enrollment by Grade For The Past 5 Years (2019-2024)

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In: Enrollment, Local Government, Maryland, MCPS, MCPS Enrollment, Research, School
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February 22, 2024 – MCPS Enrollment by Grade for the Past 5 Years

Background and Source Data

MCPS enrollment numbers by grade was determined for the school years:

  • 2019-2020
  • 2020-2021
  • 2021-2022
  • 2022-2023
  • 2023-2024

Data sources are:

Results and Conclusions

Table 1. Enrollment Numbers by Year and Grade

Enrollment numbers are shown. Enrollment varied from 10,348 (grade K, 2020-2021) to 15,262 (grade 9 2022-2023).

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Table 2. Change in Enrollment Numbers by Year and Grade

Increases in enrollment numbers are colored green, decreases in enrollment numbers are colored red.

Elementary grades K-5 and middle school grades 6-8 have generally had the most consistent decreases in enrollment.  High school grades 9-12 have been more variable, with both increases and decreases, and with large changes (eg, grade 10 with a decrease of 666 students in fall 2021, but an increase of 1181 students in fall 2022).

Table 3. Change in Enrollment Numbers between 2019-2020 and 2023-2024.

All elementary grades (K-5) and middle school grades (6-8) showed decreased enrollment.  All high school grades (9-12) showed increased enrollment.

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School Year2019-2020  2020-2021  2021-2022  2022-2023  2023-2024  
Total K-12 Enrollment160,338  156,968  154,354  156,014154,359
Table 4.  Summary of Total Enrollment Numbers

Change in Enrollment

School LevelChange in Enrollment
Elementary (K-5)-5,432
Middle (6-8)-2,072
High (9-12)+1,525
Table 5. Summary of Enrollment Changes by Elementary, Middle, High School (2023-2024 total enrollment vs 2019-2020 total enrollment)

Elementary schools have lost over 5,400 students, or approximately 10 elementary schools with an average of 540 students.  This is 200 classes (teachers) based on a class size of 27 students.

Middle schools have lost over 2,000 students, or approximately 3 middle schools based on an average of about 700 students.  High schools have gained over 1,500 students, or 1 small high school.

Note that MCPS and Maryland include prekindergarten enrollment as part of the total enrollment numbers.  There were 245 fewer students enrolled in 2023-2024 than in 2019-2020.

School Year2019-2020  2020-2021  2021-2022  2022-2023  2023-2024  
Pre-K Enrollment4,6803,5963,6394,3084,435
Table 6. Summary of Prekindergarten Enrollment

In summary, changes in enrollment vary by grade and school level.  Elementary and middle schools showed decreases in enrollment, while high schools showed increases in enrollment. Therefore, more teacher positions may be needed for high school (such as grade 10 courses) than elementary school (such as grades K-1).

See more articles by Moderately MOCO on enrollment here

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