How have changes in student numbers and needs changed school employment?

It’s a school board election year in 2023, which means attention to public education issues. I recently had lunch with a friend of 40 years who wanted to talk about education. I'm sharing some of his questions and my answers in the hope they might offer helpful information and guide some conversations about the state of public education. I've also included some "fact checks" to give more specific details if wanted.  

My friend considers himself "very" conservative on most current political issues. He would also say he supports public education, and I believe him: maybe the best description would be a critical or skeptical friend of public schools. Like me, he attended a nonpublic high school, but all his children went to public schools where he and his wife were actively involved in their kids’ schools. He studied to be and started a career in teaching before shifting to a financial services career, much of it as a self-employed entrepreneur. He spends countless hours volunteering time as a tutor at levels from middle school to adult prisons.  

A few days before our lunch, he had sent me a social media posting with a chart reflecting what purports to be national data: school funding increased nearly 80 percent more than inflation since 1993 while the number of students is down almost 7 percent; "admin" (not defined) up more than 50 percent while teachers up about 10 percent; and ACT scores flat. It's a common criticism: public schools are spending more and producing less. This post specifically suggested part of the problem was the "Tech Industry" for pushing expensive products and services with dubious results.  

I responded to that post with a link to my blog celebrating high school and college graduations in May, noting that Kansas educational attainment has never been higher when measured by the percentage of Kansans completing high school and different levels of higher education. Each additional level of education results in higher average earnings and net wealth and less poverty and unemployment rates. In other words, the "market" seems to be valuing the results of our education system.  

Total spending by Kansas public schools increased less than state personal income – the total income of all Kansas residents. Since 1993, school spending reported by the Kansas State Department of Education increased by 210 percent (not adjusted for inflation) while total income increased by 231. The difference has been even more significant since 2009, with school spending up 46 percent and personal income up 70 percent.  

"I would contend," my friend said, "That we are spending a lot more money on things that don't support the classroom teacher, and that's the most important thing. That's why we aren't getting the results we want. Tell me how I'm wrong.”  

How have enrollment and student needs changed?  

"Let's start with some of the ideas presented in the post you shared with me and compare them to Kansas," I said. "First, despite a drop following the COVID pandemic enrollment, public school enrollment has risen slightly over the past 30 years, not declined." 

Fact check: Kansas public school "headcount" enrollment, or the total number of students attending, whether full or part-time, increased from about 450,00 in 1993 to over 492,000 in 2020. That number dropped by about 18,000 in 2021 following the COVID pandemic. Through last school year, nearly half of that number has returned. So even after COVID, the number of students in public schools is up about 35,000, or 7.5 percent, from 30 years ago.  

"Kansas public school enrollment hasn't decreased over the past several decades; it's increased modestly," I said. "But what has changed a lot is the type of students schools are educating and the needs they bring to school. Far more students have educational needs that can make learning more difficult.”  

Fact check: Low-income students eligible for free or reduced-price meals have increased from less than one-third to nearly half of all students. Non-white students have increased from about 15 percent to almost 40 percent. Special education students with disabilities have increased from 32,000 to nearly 80,000. These changes have raised challenges in virtually every classroom in Kansas.  

"For some context, private schools have also had big increases in non-white, low-income and disabled students," I said. "These trends reflect social changes, affecting both public and private schools. But remember, one important difference is that private schools still have far fewer high-need students than public schools, and private school enrollment has fallen quite a bit over the past 20 years." 

Fact check: From 1993 to 2001, accredited private school enrollment grew faster than public school enrollment and peaked at about 32,000, or 6.4 percent of public schools. Since then, accredited private schools have dropped to 26,500, or 5.2 percent of public schools. Private schools also lost enrollment following COVID but have recovered and are at about the same level as in 2020. Accredited private schools have about 20 percent low-income students compared to nearly 50 percent in public schools, and about 5 percent students with disabilities compared to nearly 16 percent in public schools.  

"By the way," I said, "We don't know how many students attend non-accredited private schools, including home schools, because they aren't required to report any enrollment information, and we don't know how many students are attending any school. But we know Kansas's estimated school-aged population hasn't changed much in the last ten years." 

How have the number and types of school district employees changed?  

"If enrollment is pretty stable, what has happened to school employees?" asked my friend. "Have they grown at about the same rate? My friend's data said districts (presumably nationally) had increased teachers by 10 percent and "admin" by 50 percent.  

"School districts have added many more new positions than enrollment growth alone," I said. "We only have complete data back to about 2000, but since then, school districts have added about 8,000 jobs, more than 10 percent. A majority of those new positions aren't licensed teachers, but they aren't administrators. The biggest growth has been in special ed paraprofessionals and classroom aides who work alongside teachers directly with students. The second biggest increase has been in licensed teachers. Almost every other increase has been in positions supporting students with needs outside of the classroom and helping teachers.”  

"The biggest staff increase has been in special education, responsible for about 3,000 of the 8,000 new positions. Remember, the number of special education students has doubled," I said. "Another big area has been adding kindergarten and preschool teachers in the past 20 years as almost all public schools and many private schools moved to all-day kindergarten and expanded preschool programs. (All-day kindergarten requires double the teacher as half-day but doesn't show up as an increase in "headcount" enrollment because the students were already counted.) Most educators agree that all-day K and preschool improve student learning, but they are also extremely popular with parents and employers.  

"Districts also added many new career technical education or vocational teachers. Because these classes are more specialized, they often have small class sizes and require more teachers. The number of students taking these courses and the number of technical credentials earned has substantially increased, responding to the need for more workers with technical skills. Adding more teacher classroom aides working directly with students and supporting teachers means over 75 percent of new positions were either teachers or paras and aides supporting teachers, all DIRECTLY involved in student instruction (6,200).  

"Most of the other added positions have been student support: people who aren't directly teaching but who help students with non-instructional issues that impact learning. These include nurses, counselors, social workers, attendance staff, school resource officers to address student safety and special education positions like school psychologists and speech pathologists. Sometimes those people work right along with teachers.  

"Finally, districts have added several positions in technology to help manage increased student, staff, and parent use of devices and internet connections, and more transportation staff, school resource officers, and security staff. The increases in all these areas total more than 8,000. But districts have also reduced jobs in operations and maintenance and food service. The net jobs in central office administration and school administration are basically unchanged in the past 20 years, despite more students, many more employees to supervise, and many more administrative mandates required.”  

Fact check: Since 2001, total net FTE or full-time equivalent positions have increased by roughly 8,000, or 12.3 percent. FTE enrollment increased by about 3 percent. Licensed teachers increased by 2,600 or 8.0 percent. That includes approximately 1,000 kindergarten and pre-K teachers and 600 career technical education teachers. Districts added over 2,000 special education paraprofessionals and more than 1,200 classroom aides and other non-licensed positions under the function of instruction.  

Since 2001, about 1,500 positions have been added under "student support." Compared to 2001, districts have added nearly 1,000 positions for technology directors and other technology support positions. Still, those positions weren't counted separately until 2007, and there has only been an increase of about 250 since then. Districts have also added 220 positions in transportation, likely due to busing more students for safety and special services. Districts also cut 300 jobs in operations and maintenance and 540 jobs in food services, in some cases by outsourcing to private businesses. Net positions in other functions are primarily unchanged.  

"This shows districts have added positions about how you would expect based on changes in student needs and social trends," I said. "Schools have added special education teachers because they have double the number of special ed students, and early childhood and career tech teachers because they have increased these programs. They've added paras and aides, sometimes because they can't find qualified licensed teachers; sometimes, having these positions take some duties away from classroom teachers is more efficient. They hired counselors, social workers, and nurses because kids have more social and mental health issues. They hired more bus drivers and resource officers to improve school safety. They've added technology positions to deal with the larger role of technology in schools – like just about every other part of the society and the economy." 

Knowing my friend is concerned about supporting teachers, I suggested there is always a trade-off. "All of these new positions were either teachers or added to help teachers or help students. Would the average teacher be better off with fewer classroom aides helping them, fewer counselors and social workers, fewer people dealing with special education students, and less focus on school safety? I often hear that teachers need more help with kids, not less." 

"Now, I would agree that each of these actions is debatable," I said. "You can argue schools have done too much of one thing, not enough of the others. These are statewide totals, so individual school districts have made different choices. But I would say these actions are reasonable and defensible based on what districts were trying to accomplish.”  

It was time for a pause. This conversation will be continued.