Sioux Falls School District releases enrollment numbers. Here's what data says:

Morgan Matzen, Sioux Falls Argus Leader
·2 min read

The Sioux Falls School District has seen a “little change” this year in its enrollment numbers, according to Doug Morrison, director of research, innovation and accountability in the district.

The district reported its enrollment was at 24,316 students after an Aug. 30 internal count of all the students in the district. That’s compared to an Aug. 31, 2021 count of 24,122 students, which would equal an increase of 194 students.

Now, a more recent count from Sept. 30 shows the district includes 24,231 students, compared to a Sept. 24, 2021 count of 24,029 students. That’s an increase of 202 students from last year.

More:Early enrollment report shows Sioux Falls schools grew by 194 students this year

The district takes these two counts, one preliminary and one final, to give the board an early read on enrollment trends first, and then to fulfill the district’s state reporting requirement, since the South Dakota Department of Education takes its official enrollment counts that factor into school funding on the last Friday in September each school year.

September’s counts are lower primarily because of students that were in the district last year that haven’t shown up, but for which the district received no transfer requests, multimedia specialist Carly Uthe said, explaining the district waits 15 days until it drops them.

September’s counts also show the following:

  • An increase of 163 elementary school students from last year’s 11,154 to this year’s 11,317;

  • A dip of 86 middle school students from last year’s 5,602 to this year’s 5,516;

  • An increase of 125 high school students from last year’s 7,273 to this year’s 7,398; and,

  • Dips in junior kindergarten and pre-kindergarten enrollments, from a total of 1,108 in last year’s programs, to 1,020 in this year’s programs. That’s a loss of 88 students.

Uthe attributes the increases and decreases to the “ebbs and flows” of how various cohorts roll through to the next grade. In pre-kindergarten, however, Uthe said the district has been unable to fill some early childhood positions.

Morrison attributed the increase in elementary school enrollment to the fact that the kindergarten class is bigger than the outgoing fifth grade class.

More:How Sioux Falls ended up with Brandon, Harrisburg and Tea Area schools in its city limits

Superintendent Jane Stavem said she was happy to see a normal enrollment trajectory this year.

Seventy more students are open-enrolling into the Sioux Falls School District this year than last year, when there were 905 students coming into the district from other districts.

The majority of Sioux Falls’ 975 open-enrolled students come from Harrisburg (305), Brandon Valley (286), Tri-Valley (107) and Tea Area (104). The schools with the highest number of students open-enrolled in the district are Sonia Sotomayor Elementary School (157) and Lincoln High School (156).

This article originally appeared on Sioux Falls Argus Leader: Sioux Falls School District enrollment numbers released