NY Test Scores Plummet as Students Leave — Empty Schools Remain Open, Wasting Billions

Concerning reports continue to emerge regarding New York’s public schools. Students persistently score low on standardized tests, prompting many parents to seek better educational options.

This has resulted in school enrollments falling significantly below capacity. Nevertheless, these institutions remain operational, consuming funds without achieving any improvement in student performance.

For taxpayers and parents in search of superior schools, this situation is utterly chaotic.

According to the freshly published National Assessment of Educational Progress (often termed the “nation’s report card”): it reveals that merely 23% of eighth-graders in NYC meet proficiency standards in math, with only 29% achieving this in reading.

In math, only one-third of fourth-graders are proficient, and even less, 28%, meet proficiency in reading.

Across the state, the best performance showed just 37% of fourth-graders proficient in math.

Given such discouraging statistics, it’s no wonder that New York public schools have been among the fastest to experience student loss nationwide.

Data from the National Center for Education Statistics indicate that between Fall 2019 and 2023, the state experienced a student decline of 5.9%, surpassing all but four other states.

For example, New York lost 3.6 percentage points more students than neighboring Pennsylvania and 0.7 points more than California.

Over 80% of New York school districts still have enrollment numbers below pre-pandemic levels.

Considering New York’s demographic shifts, marked by declining kindergarten enrollments and reduced birth rates, it’s unlikely that student numbers will recover in the near future.

Thus, legislators and taxpayers must diligently observe the necessity for school districts to shut down under-enrolled schools when appropriate.

Research from the Reason Foundation indicates that New York’s public school districts have been slow to close schools post-pandemic, only returning to pre-COVID closure levels in the last school year.

Despite a decline of 215,000 students, just 104 traditional public schools were closed between the 2017-2018 and 2023-2024 school years.

In 2024, New York only shut down 16 public schools across the state, with the city closing none.

In contrast, other states with significantly smaller populations closed nearly as many schools, and some even more.

For instance, among the 15 states analyzed, Colorado (which has less than one-third the population of New York) closed 26 public schools in 2024, despite having a lower percentage of students lost compared to New York.

Iowa closed 12 schools last year, while South Dakota shut down 11. This illustrates that New York is not appropriately adapting to its shrinking enrollment numbers.

New York districts have managed to defer closures because the Legislature routinely sanctions large budget increases.

Recent federal data shows that New York schools receive $35,902 in per-student revenues, the highest in the nation.

Additionally, New York City schools, as the largest in the country, obtain $44,790 for each child.

The Empire Center reports that state funding per pupil has doubled over the last 12 years, rising from $7,264 to $14,304.

These significant funding increases have allowed districts to avoid making difficult decisions regarding school closures.

Legislators have even upheld a “hold harmless” funding policy, ensuring that districts do not receive less funding year-over-year, regardless of significant student loss.

Estimates from Georgetown University’s Edunomics Lab suggest that districts managing under-enrolled schools could save about 4% annually by closing one out of every 15 schools.

Moreover, research by Michigan State’s Center for Local Government Finance indicates potential savings of up to 15% of a district’s annual spending per student for each school that is closed.

Indeed, school closures can be politically sensitive. Shutting down schools often necessitates navigating complex bureaucratic processes and facing significant opposition from teacher unions and parents.

Consequently, it’s perhaps understandable that state and local officials may hesitate to rectify the situation of under-enrollment.

However, as disruptive and politically challenging as this may be, postponing school closures is financially unsustainable in the wake of a massive student loss.

Rather than continuing to support significantly under-enrolled schools with billions of dollars in additional funding year after year, local and state leaders must instill some financial sanity back into New York’s public education system by consolidating under-enrolled schools.

Christian Barnard is an education policy analyst and assistant director of education reform at Reason Foundation.