About Enrollment Forecasts

SchoolSite Enrollment Forecast is a way to ensure your district has the appropriate staff to fulfill future classroom requirements. SchoolSite Enrollment Forecasts utilize current resident and enrollment information, as well as historic student mobility to calculate an estimated enrollment for each school. This method of strategic and planned staffing can help to evaluate the current state of facilities, as well as future needs.

Two-Year Enrollment Forecasts

Mid-term to long-term facilities planning is always best when it is based upon the resident location of future student populations, rather than the enrollment at the individual schools. However, a two year forecasted enrollment can be used to assist with estimating staffing and budget requirements over the short term.

Methodology for Schools with Attendance Boundaries

Calculating an enrollment forecast for schools with attendance boundaries is different from calculating it for a school without attendance boundaries. For school with attendance boundaries, the two year forecasted enrollment is calculated using a combination of future resident population and historic transfer patterns for each school.

Similar to the mobility factors in the residence forecasts, a cohort is derived by averaging four years of past transfer patterns. The cohort is calculated for both transfers into and out of each school for each grade between 1 and 12 that the school serves. This cohort is then applied to the current transfer by grade of the base year students to come up with estimated in and estimated out transfers for the future years. To estimate the transfers in and transfers out for the lowest grade served at each school, an average is taken of the last four years of transfers. Finally, forecasted enrollment by grade for each school is calculated by taking the forecasted resident population, and adding the estimated transfers in and transfers out.

Methodology for Schools without Attendance Boundaries

To calculate an enrollment forecast for schools without attendance boundaries, a different method of calculation is used. Transfers in and transfers out for the lowest grade served at each school are estimated by taking an average of the last four years of transfers. Each subsequent grade is calculated using the non-weighted cohort survival method and applied to the current year’s enrollment.