St. Louis Public Schools was one of America鈥檚 largest school systems in the late-1960s, educating 115,000 students at its peak. But at the beginning of the 2026鈥�27 academic year, after decades of erosion and poor performance, that number fell below 17,000.

Explanations for the swoon are diverse and mostly dispiriting, including persistently high crime rates and a weakened local economy that has led several generations of families to leave town. A recent leadership carousel that saw four different superintendents in just over three years hasn鈥檛 helped matters. Whatever the cause, however, city leaders now face the question of what to do about a district reduced to approximately 15 percent of its former size.

Last month, Superintendent Myra Berry that some have long seen as inevitable: closing 14 under-enrolled schools by next fall, repurposing the buildings, and distributing their students to nearby alternatives. In addition to saving an estimated $24 million, the plan would allow Berry and her team to reduce logistical and maintenance demands to a more manageable scale .

The mutually reinforcing dynamics of academic dysfunction and plummeting head counts are essentially unique to St. Louis; even its sister metropolis, Kansas City, has seen steady growth in its surrounding area over the last few decades. But total enrollment across Missouri schools undeniably fell over the last quarter-century, a gradual slide that has gained momentum since the COVID-19 pandemic. And with birthrates falling below the replacement level, as in other states, most local leaders will have to rely on an aging tax base to pay for schools educating fewer and fewer children.

The contours of that dilemma differ according to the circumstances in each of the state鈥檚 516 districts. To a greater extent than almost anywhere else in the country, funding for Missouri鈥檚 K鈥�12 schools is dependent on local rather than state revenues. Urban centers, anchored by major corporate employers but increasingly exposed to school choice, confront different challenges than rural farming communities 鈥� which are themselves a world apart from the scattered pockets of growth in the suburbs. Yet there has been little guidance from state authorities on how communities should proceed.

A minister and author based in Springfield, the state鈥檚 third-largest city, Brittany Rust realized the scale of the problem when her son鈥檚 elementary school was scheduled for closure in 2004. After indicated that the school district would lose hundreds of pupils through the 2030s, Pershing Elementary was one of several K鈥�5 campuses dissolved in order to free up funds for a renovation to a nearby middle school. 

Still, Rust believed the families of Pershing could persuade the community to keep their doors open. She and her colleagues on the school鈥檚 Parent-Teacher Association 鈥� 鈥渟mall but mighty鈥� at just five members 鈥� lauded the school鈥檚 safe and close-knit learning environment in a presentation before the school board, but its members voted unanimously to carry out the downsizing.

The decision came as 鈥渁 shock,鈥� Rust recalled.

鈥淲e thought we’d have at least a few people on our side,鈥� she said. 鈥淲e’d been around for a long time, and we felt like we made a good case. It was just, obviously, discouraging.”

Collin Hitt is the executive director of the , an education research collaborative at Saint Louis University. In an interview, he said that the generational task that boards and superintendents must grapple with is how to 鈥済et smaller and get better at the same time.鈥�

鈥淚t’s most extreme in St. Louis,鈥� he acknowledged. 鈥淏ut if you’re leading a school district with assumptions of huge enrollment growth, it’s probably time to change those plans.”

A 鈥榩ersonnel boom鈥� amid dwindling enrollment

Those sentiments were echoed by Cory Koedel, a professor of economics and public policy at the University of Missouri. Compared with other states, Missouri鈥檚 population trends don鈥檛 necessarily qualify as 鈥渁 flashing red warning beacon鈥� yet, he said. But he predicted that, in order to keep on top of rising costs, more districts would need to follow the example of St. Louis in making critical changes to how education is provided.

鈥淲e just keep giving more and more money to schools, and fiscally, that can’t go on forever,鈥� Koedel said. 鈥淪o the rubber is going to meet the road here pretty soon.”

According to his most recent research, in fact, the skid marks are already becoming visible.

Last month, the right-leaning Show-Me Institute co-authored by Koedel that tracked K鈥�12 figures across the state since 2000. During that time, it found, total enrollment fell from roughly 892,000 to 855,000, or about 4 percent. But spending on employees has simultaneously grown; full-time employment for teachers expanded by 12.8 percent, and administrator employment ballooned by about 34.9 percent.

Considerable differences exist between individual regions and communities. For example, public schools in cities (not inclusive of charter schools) have lost slightly less than one-quarter of their students in the 21st century, while those in rural areas are down around one-tenth; suburban schools have actually grown by 5 percent. 

The phenomenon that has stayed consistent is what Koedel calls a 鈥減ersonnel boom鈥�: spending on staff that outpaces enrollment. In areas like St. Louis, where student rolls have thinned by 63.4 percent over the period under observation, teacher staffing also fell 鈥� but only by 50.5 percent. And while the enrollment in the St. Louis suburb of Wentzville has more than tripled since 2000, its growth in administrators has totaled a staggering 329 percent. 

鈥淲hat stays about the same is that gap between staffing and enrollment,鈥� Koedel said. 鈥淲hen students go down, teachers always go down by less. When students go up, teachers go up by more.”  

Representatives of St. Louis Public Schools declined to comment for this story, but other district leaders spoke of growing difficulties posed by their demographic realities.

Melissa Schneider is the superintendent of Parkway Public Schools, a district serving eight separate municipalities in St. Louis County. Its head counts sank by 15 percent between 2000 and 2011, then by a further 5 percent in the years since. Schneider said the area was dealing with enrollment questions similar to those confronting many others in the region. Increasingly, she wrote in an email, seniors were choosing to stay longer in their homes, while young families with school-aged children have struggled to cope with rising home costs. 

鈥淲e are a largely built-out suburban community with an aging housing stock and relatively little opportunity for large-scale new residential development,鈥� she observed. 鈥淭hose conditions influence how many new families with school-age children move into the district.鈥�

Nearby Rockwood School District, numbering over 18,000 students, is weighing a similar conundrum. After seeing fairly healthy growth through 2011, the system has lost about 10 percent of its enrollment over the last decade. District-wide employment has shrunk somewhat in the past few years, but not nearly enough to match the shortfall of pupils.

Superintendent Curtis Cain came to Rockwood in 2022 after leading fast-growing Wentzville for nine years. He recalled in an interview that head counts there exploded by about 4,000 students over his tenure, and he鈥檇 opened three elementary schools, a middle school, and two high schools just to keep pace.

The difference in Rockwood was like 鈥渘ight and day,鈥� Cain reflected. While he noted the decline presented opportunities to get more value out of space and resources 鈥� the community now enjoys a ratio of 13.5 students for each teacher, compared with 17.2 in 2000 鈥� it also raised unavoidable questions about employment. Thus far, natural attrition has allowed the district to lower expenses without resorting to school closures or layoffs. But each retirement now raises the question of whether a given position will be filled.

鈥淭eams, departments, grades that have been together for some time may not be able to persist that way,鈥� Cain said. 鈥淭he answer is not always going to be no, but it cannot always be yes.鈥�

鈥楩ree for all鈥�

Occasionally, a 鈥測es鈥� may even precede a 鈥渘o.鈥�

That鈥檚 what happened in St. Louis, where over the past four years rehabilitating aging facilities, including HVAC upgrades and lead abatement. Yet $24 million of those expenditures, or more than 20 percent of the total, were directed toward schools listed on the district鈥檚 closure plan.

The spending is likely not wholly wasted, as the buildings may eventually be sold or converted to other purposes. But the lurch between capital campaigns and shutdowns illustrates the need for careful planning as districts look to the future. Both demographics and budgetary imperatives can change unexpectedly; even when they don鈥檛, conditions in schools do.

After the in January 2024, Pershing Elementary was kept open for two more years while nearby schools prepared to receive its students. During that time, Brittany Rust remembered, morale suffered as families and teachers began leaving preemptively.

Those departures left classrooms thinner. Her son, who attended Pershing since kindergarten, spent a year in a classroom made up  of second- and third-graders, with a new teacher attempting to blend instruction from separate curricula. The school was left hiring novices or asking retirees to sign on for a year at a time, a process Rust described as a 鈥渇ree-for-all.鈥�

鈥淏y the time we got to the last year, they were just trying to fill jobs with temporary teachers,鈥� she said. 鈥淥bviously, if you’re not going to have a job, and you find something somewhere else, we understand. But that hurts our kids.鈥�

Rust said she understood the budgetary constraints under which the board was operating. By the time Pershing ceased operations this June, though, she wished they had acted to close it immediately.

There is no perfect, or perhaps even palatable, method of closing schools and scattering their students elsewhere. The calculations become even more complicated in Missouri鈥檚 largest cities, where enrollment pressures are mounting even as new educational models like charter schools have made a splashy emergence over the past few decades.

Growth in the sector has historically been limited to Kansas City and St. Louis, where charters enroll nearly one-half of all public school students, according to from the PRiME Center. But the state legislature recently passed a law expanding charter access in other areas, with one .

Leslie Kohlmeyer is a Kansas City parent who runs , a nonprofit that helps parents navigate public school enrollment systems in both her home city and St. Louis. Though a supporter of charter schools generally, she noted that previously booming demand for educational alternatives has quieted noticeably.

鈥淧eople want to open a school because they have a great idea, and I love that because maybe it鈥檚 filling a void in the landscape,鈥� she said. 鈥淏ut we have schools that are highly performing, and they can’t keep their seats filled because there aren’t enough kids. I worry about those schools.”

鈥楧emographic winter鈥�

It remains to be seen how districts like Parkway and Rockwood will adjust to accelerating declines in the number of school-aged children across Missouri. 

Alarmed by recent patterns, Rockwood that predicted further losses of up to 15 percent of its student rolls through the middle of the 2030s. Just over the next five years, Missouri鈥檚 total enrollment will fade by 3.9 percent, by the PRiME Center.

The state is not alone. It was one of 20 around the U.S. where births were outnumbered by deaths during the interval between 2020 and 2023. Declining rates of international migration to the Midwest across both the metropolitan hubs and agricultural zones. 

Ness Sandoval, a professor of sociology at Saint Louis University, is considered among the top authorities on local demographics. His public statements on the subject have recently taken a discouraging tone.

Since a peak of nearly 82,000 babies born in Missouri in 2007, the state鈥檚 birth rate has fallen dramatically; he estimates that about 140,000 fewer children have been enrolled in public, private, charter, and homeschooling over the last decade. The St. Louis region, he added, has seen the third-largest drop of total births since 2020, and its decline leads the nation in percentage terms. 

In particular, Sandoval wrote in an email, the state鈥檚 non-Hispanic white population is entering 鈥渄emographic winter,鈥� with deaths outnumbering births since long before the pandemic. Latino families 鈥� a group under increased pressure as the Trump administration pushes harder on immigration enforcement 鈥� account for over 80 percent of total population growth during the 2020s, he added.

鈥淚 think there is little the state can do,鈥� Sandoval wrote, noting that he has previously recommended that Parkway and Rockville combine into a single district. 鈥淭he community will age. Schools will close or merge. The elderly population will start to consume more resources.鈥� 

With fewer parents and children living in most communities, local politics will likely favor cuts to taxes. Missouri鈥檚 K鈥�12 funding model is a national outlier in its dependence on local tax revenues; in the 2022鈥�23 academic year, just 28.6 percent of their funding from the state government, compared with an average of 45.1 percent in the nation as a whole.

Politicians in Jefferson City have attempted to lessen tax burdens by allowing counties to freeze property rates for senior citizens. A number of local governments have taken up the idea, including St. Louis County 鈥� but that move to school budgets or transfer the costs onto younger homeowners, including families using schools. Parkway Public Schools has projected a loss over the next decade.

Springfield is another city with an aging populace, as Baby Boomers have and opted to remain in their homes. Rust noted that parts of her own neighborhood, developed in the 1950s and dominated by ranch homes and , seem oddly devoid of young children.

That means the school system isn鈥檛 likely to bolster its declining numbers. In fact, families have shown a greater willingness to pull their kids out of the public school system altogether. A lifelong resident, Rust said homeschooling was a rarity in her childhood, exemplified by members at her church who sought explicitly religious instruction; today, around the state, she increasingly encounters parents looking for non-parochial academies and microschools. 

As Pershing wound down its final year, she was one of just three remaining members of the PTA. All three have now taken their sons and daughters out of public schools.

鈥淲e were the most involved families in the school, the most bought-in,鈥� she lamented. 鈥淏ut seeing the weaknesses of it, and knowing that there are other options now, we’re going to take them. I think that’s a lot of people now.”

Correction: An earlier version of this story cited data regarding the number of public school students enrolled in charter schools that was incorrect. According to updated information from the PRiME Center, nearly half of public school students are enrolled in charters.

To see why, consider the plight of Missouri lawmakers, whose most recent attempt at charter funding reform, , is the subject of a by my organization.

Since their inception in 1998, charters have seen their share of total enrollment increase to roughly 41% of public school students in St. Louis and 51% in Kansas City, while enrollment in traditional district schools in both cities has halved.

That growth hasn’t come at the expense of students, who make if they enroll in a charter school.

Yet, despite their strong track record and seismic shift in enrollment, the Show Me State鈥檚 charters have been systematically excluded from local revenues, the vast majority of which still flow through traditional school districts that have no legal obligation to share them.

Mathematically speaking, that means the same number of dollars have been divided between ever fewer district students. As of the 2024-25 school year, both Saint Louis Public Schools and Kansas City Public Schools now receive in local revenues per student, which is more than receive from all revenue sources combined.

In practice, this trend has left state policymakers who are reluctant to anger district-affiliated parents and educators with a difficult choice: allow the state鈥檚 ever-expanding roster of charters to operate at an ever-increasing competitive disadvantage or write ever-larger checks to charters in the name of funding equity.

Prior to HB 1552, their preference for the first of those options meant Missouri鈥檚 charters received about 30% less in total revenues per pupil than traditional public schools in the two districts. But things changed in 2022, when, to the surprise of many observers, the legislature decided it would try to close the district-charter gap with new state dollars.

The resulting funding shock, likely the largest in the history of the charter school movement, has so far increased revenues by roughly $4,000 per charter school student.

Yet, because districts鈥� local funding per pupil is increasing so quickly 鈥� and because of the complexity of the state鈥檚 funding formula 鈥� true equity remains elusive. Despite the unprecedented infusion of state funding, our shows that the St. Louis and Kansas City districts still receive about $5,500 more per pupil than charters there do.

It’s hard to imagine districts’ administrators in these locations objecting to this arrangement. But what about taxpayers, who are now on the hook for nearly $200 million per year in pursuit of the frustratingly elusive goal of funding equity? And what about kids in the rest of the state, where total funding per pupil is now almost $10,000 lower than in its two big urban areas?

Already, the cost of HB 1552 is , nearly triple the state鈥檚 initial projections. And if nothing is done, simple arithmetic suggests it will continue to rise as more students exit district schools for charters.

Allowing districts to keep local dollars may have been politically expedient in the charter school movement鈥檚 early years, but it is becoming untenable 鈥� and not just in Missouri.

Despite enrolling just 7.8% of America鈥檚 public school students overall, in a growing number of cities 鈥� places like San Antonio, Phoenix and Flint, Michigan 鈥� charter enrollment is approaching half of their districts’ public school population.

Consequently, the arithmetic of allowing the country’s biggest urban districts to monopolize local resources is becoming increasingly ridiculous 鈥� and increasingly unpalatable for political leaders hoping to appeal to a majority of parents and taxpayers.

To see where things are headed, consider the path taken by Indianapolis, where a political feedback loop has clearly taken hold. Around 2021, charter schools crossed the politically and psychologically important 50% mark. In 2023, state legislators passed a law requiring Indianapolis Public Schools to share its local revenues with charter schools in the district on an equitable basis. Then, this year, the state created the Indianapolis Public Education Corp.  to oversee the distribution of those revenues and promote better coordination in areas like facilities and transportation, where charters have also been excluded.

Already, these changes are intensifying the pressure to consolidate or repurpose underutilized schools in a community that has seen a precipitous decline in the number of K-12-aged children 鈥� from nearly 100,000 students to about 40,000 鈥� which makes sense if you think staffing and maintaining mostly empty buildings is a poor use of resources.

Even in places without such fiscal and operational pressures, the political ground is shifting. Twenty years ago, the notion that public dollars could flow to a secular, nonprofit, privately operated school of choice was considered controversial 鈥� never mind that charters must adhere to the same content standards and testing requirements as traditional public schools and admit students regardless of race, gender or sexual orientation.

Yet today, with entire communities increasingly educating most of their children in charters 鈥� and with Republican states increasingly opting to expand vouchers, education savings accounts and other less regulated forms of school choice 鈥� claims that charters are destroying public education feel a bit behind the times.

Yes, it could be a mistake to embrace a choice-based education system in a country that has been fragmenting without one. Or it could be time for those who would defend America’s public education system to recognize charter schools for what they are: the most transparent, accountable and egalitarian form of school choice a local community can provide, and fund them accordingly.