Continued declines in student enrollment could impact the Oak Harbor School District’s budget this school year and the next several.
The school board and staff discussed the issue during a school board meeting last week. According to details provided to the board, estimates show declines in enrollment until at least the 2030-31 school year for students in traditional K-12 education, or basic education, and those in alternate learning environments, like HomeConnection and the Oak Harbor Virtual Academy.
As a result, 175 fewer full-time equivalent students are enrolled ahead of the upcoming school year compared to the last which, based on 2024-25 formulas, means a projected associated revenue loss north of $2.1 million, according to the presentation. The current draft sets the budget at about $118 million.
Enrollment-based funding from the state is allocated per student depending on whether they are enrolled full- or part-time as well as their educational environment. Part-time students count for a fraction of a full-time equivalent.
Statewide, basic education allocation has already struggled to keep pace with the “actual cost of educating students” and “rising expenses,” Communications Officer Sarah Foy said in an email.
Losing more than $2.1 million hurts apportionment from the state and is a hit to the district’s economy scale, which allows the district to support higher compensation levels. It also impacts Local Effort Assistance revenue formulas, which determine the funding the district receives for activities meant to enrich students’ learning.
According to Foy, “enrollment in Oak Harbor has fluctuated over the past decade” but has “seen a steady downward trend” since the 2018-19 school year. Declines have affected “nearly all grades in recent years, with the current exception of grades 3-6,” the “most significant” of which exhibited by “incoming kindergarten classes.”
Of note, Foy added that enrollment declines are not unique to Oak Harbor, occurring in school districts across the state and nation.
As for whether similar budgetary losses are projected for the next six school years that enrollment declines are, Foy said the district is “projecting and planning” for further declines “likely” to “result in ongoing budget reductions if funding formulas remain the same.”
Additionally, the current budget draft sees an increase in money allocated towards special education instruction from $21,620,646, or about 19% of the 2024-25 budget, to $25,682,525, or about 22% of the 2025-26 budget. According to the presentation, costs projected for special education are the “conservative scenario.”
That increase arrives in the wake of the removal of the special education enrollment cap, which limited funding received by Washington school districts for special education programs and services to 16% of its total students. A Community Impact Safety Net was also eliminated, which “acknowledged” the school district has “community-based reasons” for exceeding the cap, Chief Financial Officer Amber Porter said at the meeting.
Porter explained these moves essentially cancel each other out in the budgeting process. The removal of the cap does, however, necessitate careful observation of special education enrollment going forward.
“Because the cap is gone, we need to really watch special education enrollment, because when it was capped at 16% and you were well above 16%, you didn’t have to monitor it so closely,” Porter said. “But now, we’ll be watching that because it has a direct impact on our revenues.”
Special education projected costs are still under review and could be updated before the budget’s adoption, or “further review or audit” could continue through 2025-26.
