America's public schools are closing at the fastest pace since the pandemic — and the empty seats are multiplying even faster than the padlocks. A total of 1,156 public schools closed during the last academic year, the highest number since the pandemic, according to an analysis of federal data by Big Local News at Stanford University, reported by the Associated Press in partnership with The Hechinger Report.

Source: The Hechinger Report / Associated Press

The closures are not keeping up with the shrinkage. Nationwide, public school enrollment fell by more than 1.4 million students — roughly 3 percent — between fall 2019 and 2024, according to the AP analysis of federal education data collected by Stanford University economist Thomas Dee and sociologist Jaymes Pyne. The total number of schools, by contrast, has declined only to about its pre-pandemic level, which the researchers say means closures are lagging enrollment declines — and that more painful financial choices lie ahead for districts across the country.

A structural decline, not a pandemic blip

Data from the National Center for Education Statistics show public-school enrollment fell from about 50.8 million students in fall 2019 to 49.4 million in fall 2024, a 2.8 percent reduction concentrated in the earlier grades. The federal agency projects further declines through 2031. Lower birth rates — in a multi-decade slide — are the primary reason, the reporting found, but a federal crackdown on immigration and the post-pandemic expansion of private school vouchers and homeschool options have also contributed to the decline.

The money follows the children, and that is where the squeeze tightens. A June policy brief from WestEd and Bellwether estimated that enrollment losses could reduce annual state education revenue by $11.5 billion by 2030-31, potentially prompting widespread layoffs, cuts to academic programs and further closures. The report projects declines in 40 states and the District of Columbia, and notes that the students who remain may need more intensive services — including English-language instruction, disability supports and help tied to poverty — so lower enrollment does not mean proportionally lower need.

Vallejo, California: half the students, a quarter of the schools gone

In Vallejo, a working-class city near San Francisco still recovering from the closure of a naval base in the 1990s, enrollment has tumbled from nearly 18,000 in fall 2006 to about 9,300, according to the district. Vallejo City Unified has closed five campuses since 2025 — a quarter of its schools — and has placed up to a third of all staff positions on the chopping block to help plug a $36 million deficit. Its schools were, on average, only 46 percent full. The district is no stranger to crisis: in the early 2000s mismanagement brought it to the brink of bankruptcy, the state stepped in with a $60 million emergency bailout, and state oversight lasted until summer 2024. One-time Covid-19 relief money that had been paying staff salaries evaporated early last year, just as enrollment dipped below 10,000 for the first time.

"We're not just closing schools to close schools," Superintendent Rubén Aurelio said. "We're right-sizing a district that was built for significantly more kids. And if we're going to actually improve outcomes for the kids we still have, we need to concentrate resources." California has recorded one of the nation's most precipitous enrollment drops, but Vallejo is not alone: large systems in Cleveland, Houston and Philadelphia are facing similar closures, the reporting found. In receiving classrooms in Vallejo this fall, the strain showed in class sizes of 32 to 34 students — and in families choosing charter schools, homeschooling, or moving away altogether.

Closures rarely save what districts hope — and can set students back

Research cited in the reporting warns that closing a school is not a clean budget fix: busing students to reassigned schools, severance for laid-off staff and security for empty buildings often eat up the savings, and closures can push still more families toward charter or private schools. A Stanford study of districts from 2011 through 2019 found closures were associated with lower spending but also with lower revenue as additional families left, with no significant improvement in districts' overall fiscal position. A forthcoming study using Texas education and labor-market records found closures reduced test scores and increased absenteeism and disciplinary actions, with effects on high-school completion, college attainment, employment and earnings — larger for secondary students and those from economically disadvantaged families. Marisa de la Torre of the UChicago Consortium on School Research said displaced students often suffer long-term drops in reading and math: "It takes a while to recover, if they recover at all."

What happens next

Federal projections and state funding formulas point the same way: more districts will have to consider consolidations, staffing cuts or redesigned programs as smaller cohorts move through the grades. WestEd and Bellwether recommend updated funding formulas, better forecasts and state support for long-range facility planning. For families — including the many immigrant families for whom a neighbourhood school is a first anchor in a new country — the practical questions in any closure plan are the receiving school's capacity and quality, class sizes, transportation time, whether disability and language-support records follow the child, and whether promised savings survive the families who leave. In Vallejo, a facilities committee will eventually decide what happens to the vacant campuses; nationally, the next measure will not be how many buildings close, but whether the students they held land somewhere better.