New Bedford school enrollment down 329 students, or 2.6%, as district plans for 2027-28

NEW BEDFORD New Bedford Public Schools counted 12,120 students in the enrollment report it filed with the state in October, 329 fewer than a year earlier, a drop of 2.6%, Superintendent Andrew O'Leary told the School Committee on Monday, Nov. 9, as the district begins planning for the 2027-28 school year.

The October count is the standard report the state uses to set each district's school aid, O'Leary said, and the district's slide noted that this year's count sets New Bedford's Chapter 70 state aid for fiscal 2028. He told the committee the district had never seen a decline like this one, though he said districts across Massachusetts are seeing the same thing.

The district's Finance and Operations department posted a video of his presentation on its Facebook page Wednesday morning, writing that enrollment declines "present an enormous challenge as comprehensive school districts plan for school year 2027-28." O'Leary said the district is building its plans for the budget year that begins July 1, 2027.

Where the numbers moved

The district's comparison of its October 2025 and October 2026 counts shows English learners down 300 students to 2,888, or 9.4%, and immigrant students down 174 to 882, or 16.5%. Recently arrived English learners fell by 656, from 1,100 to 444, while students whose first language is not English fell by 217 to 5,272, or 4%.

Special education enrollment for ages 3 to 21 rose by 61 students to 3,042, up 2%, and the number of students with Section 504 plans rose by 51 to 600, up 9.3%, according to the same slide.

O'Leary said English learners and recently arrived immigrant students had long helped offset declines in other groups, and that those numbers are now going down as well. The growing share of students with individualized education programs, or IEPs, can bring its own cost pressures, he said, a subject he told the committee he would take up later in his report. The October report counts each of those groups, along with low-income students, in ways that shape state aid, he said.

A decade of steady numbers

O'Leary said the district's kindergarten through grade 12 enrollment had been relatively stable for 10 years or more, apart from swings in prekindergarten numbers during the pandemic. The state education department's figures show the same picture, with New Bedford enrolling 12,640 students in 2016-17, 12,505 in 2024-25 and 12,441 in 2025-26 (the district's slide puts last fall's count at 12,449), a dip of about 1.6% over nine years by our math.

Statewide, public school enrollment fell from 953,748 to 900,487 over the same years, a drop of about 5.6%, according to the state figures.

O'Leary said the decline reached half or more of Massachusetts districts last year, while New Bedford and some other cities held steady, and that it now reaches close to every district in the state. He described the drop as new for New Bedford but not for Massachusetts, where districts have seen it over the past two years.

He tied the decline to birth rates, housing and the number of people moving into the area, a pattern he said is playing out nationally, statewide and now in New Bedford. Massachusetts has grown its population of young people since 2001, he said, and its school funding was built on the assumption that the growth would continue, an assumption he said is now being seriously challenged.

Planning for next year

O'Leary said the district is speeding up its planning for the fiscal 2028 budget, because the students counted on Oct. 1, 2027, are the students the schools will serve throughout that year. The work is less about dollars and cents than about staffing the buildings and the experiences they offer young people, he said, and that depends on a sound fiscal footing, which he credited to a decade of steady budgets built on the committee's work and productive finance subcommittee meetings.

South Coast 360 has asked O'Leary for comment and for a copy of the enrollment presentation, and will update this story.

Our Nov. 7 preview has the rest of the Nov. 9 agenda, including the first reading of an artificial intelligence use policy.

How to weigh in

The School Committee's next regular meeting is Monday, Dec. 14, according to its Nov. 9 agenda, which set aside time for public comment near the end of the open session. The committee's office is in the Paul Rodrigues Administration Building, 455 County St., and can be reached at 508-997-4511.

Label: Reported by us, from the town's posted records.