Springfield area school districts brace for slow, flat enrollment

Enrollment in Missouri public schools has been on the decline for years, and that trend – largely driven by declining birth rates – has reached the Ozarks.

Formerly fast-growing districts butted up against Springfield’s are showing flat or slowed growth. Some area districts are reporting enrollment dips for the first time in years.

For example, Nixa Public Schools grew steadily for three decades, but between the fall counts in 2021 and 2025 only netted 23 students. A new demographic report has projected a decrease of 7%, or nearly 500 students, in the next decade.

“We have entered into a new phase that now requires a serious revision of previous growth models,” said Brenda Rantz, chief financial officer for the district.

Missouri public schools reported a collective enrollment of nearly 900,000 as recently as 2010, but the number dropped to just 856,002 in 2025. The growth of private schools and homeschooling are factors, along with a declining birth rate. According to the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services, the 2023 provisional birth count of 67,065 was the lowest since 1945.

“Statewide, over the last five to 10 years, there’s actually been about a 3% to 4% decline in overall K-12 numbers,” said Bruce Douglas, chief information officer for Springfield Public Schools. “We’re back at enrollment numbers that we have not seen since the mid-’90s.”

SPS has maintained fairly flat enrollment overall in recent years. There are fewer K-12 students learning in person than a decade ago, but the district has expanded early childhood education and full-time online learning programs.

Funding factor
Stagnant, declining or slow growth can have an impact on state funding over time – which is largely based on enrollment and average daily attendance – and hamper the ability to add staff and programs, district leaders say.

“The downside, obviously, is revenue because that is how we are funded through the state,” said Travis Shaw, deputy superintendent of operations for SPS. “As we see enrollment going down, and we lose revenue, and it also then starts getting into the conversation around efficiency and the utilization of schools.”

Preston Smith, principal owner of Business Information Services LLC, which completed the Nixa demographic report, said the slowdown was due in part to a flattened birth rate and lack of affordable housing.

He wrote, in the 2026 demographic report: “Nixa is an outstanding, award-winning district, but the weaknesses in the current demographic and economic factors are hindering its future enrollment growth.”

Kevin Kopp, deputy superintendent, said the district was growing an average of 80 to 100 students a year until the pandemic, when it started to fluctuate and then slow significantly.

“It’s a little surprising, but we are adjusting,” he said. “Our population has aged a bit as well, as we discovered, and then the new housing going in isn’t producing the amount of students like it used to, which is interesting.”

Kopp said the district will continue to monitor enrollment closely and look at the immediate and long-term facility needs.

“We’re buying ourselves a little time. However, we do still need to be very strategic in our thinking in terms of five to 10 years out,” he said. “The junior high still feels pretty maxed out. We have an opportunity for future construction at the high school, if we ever need it.”

He said the district will continue to focus heavily on academics and programs that prepare students for success in college and careers.

Whitney Guison, president and CEO of the Nixa Area Chamber of Commerce, said there is a connection between a valuable school district and population and business growth in a community.

“For a community like Nixa, the schools are a driver. It’s that anchor that brings people to our community, and then they look for the business that they are going to work for because they want their kids to go to a school that is as valuable as Nixa is, as good as they are,” she said. “It really brings in our community members first and then you see that commercial growth follow.”

Guison said business owners and city leaders understand the value of a good district and invest time and resources to support schools.

“We see in Nixa people coming and opening businesses because they want their kids to be in the school district,” she said.

Balancing enrollment
In the Ozark School District, the Board of Education recently voted to shift a key attendance boundary along U.S. 65 between West Elementary, which has 615 students, and the 466-student North Elementary. The aim was to balance enrollment.

“Districtwide, the enrollment has declined over the past few years, and North has experienced quite a bit of that decrease. It has declined by 88 students in the past five years,” said Ozark Superintendent Lori Wilson. “West has increased for a while, but then has remained stable, and our lower grades are the ones that we are starting to lose students in.”

Wilson said the changing demographics created inequity in class sizes and staffing.

She said a recent demographic report projected flat enrollment due in part to low birth rates and more interest in homeschool or private school options. Enrollment dropped by slightly more than 2% in the past years, which may result in fewer teaching jobs for the 2026-27 year.

“We are looking at our class sizes and our sections, and I think right now we are not replacing four teachers,” she said.

In a time of financial belt-tightening, Wilson said the enrollment dip has caused stressful discussions.

“When you start targeting about attrition, that is always hard,” she said.

She said staffing decisions are difficult, but there is a silver lining when years of student growth level off for a period.

“You’re not looking at the next building you’re going to have to build. You are starting to look at how can we maintain what we have,” she said. “Now that we have a breather on that, we can look at playgrounds, we can look at roofs. We can do those kinds of things.”

Willard Public Schools experienced an enrollment dip during the pandemic and has started to bounce back. Superintendent Eric Wilken said North Elementary has logged the most growth in the past five years, and the district is expecting “pockets of growth” near Central and Orchard Hills elementary schools.

“We’re actually up in each of the last two years, not a lot, but we’re up,” he said.

Like neighboring districts, kindergarten classes have been smaller.

“We’ve looked at our demographic study, and families are having fewer children,” he said. “That is what we’re seeing across the state overall. Parents used to have three and four kids, and now some are having zero and maybe just one.”

New strategies
Matt Pearce, superintendent of the Republic School District, said enrollment is still growing but not at the pace it was 6-8 years ago.

“We have more families moving in that either have older children or do not have children in the system,” he said. “When you think about how many houses have been sold in Republic, the number of students that we’ve increased is a little bit less than we would have thought.”

Pearce said families with preschool-age children often delay enrolling or get busy. This semester, for the first time, the district opted to be proactively reach out.

“We’ve never really had to advertise that or advocate for it because it just happened,” he said.

He added: “We have started to do some things a little bit differently. We’re more reminding people than we are trying to entice them to join us.”

Tyler Overstreet, assistant superintendent of academics in Republic, said headcount has been smaller in kindergarten, but there has been an enrollment bump partway through elementary school.

“We’ve learned that some people are maybe trying to start out homeschooling or starting their kids late,” said Overstreet, who will move into Republic’s top district job July 1 after Pearce retires. “But, by the time they are hitting second, third or fourth grade, they’re enrolling them with us.”

Zac Rantz, chief communication officer for the Nixa district, said the report shows more the city is still growing but the influx is more than young families. “They are moving here because they can develop a life here. It’s not just for the schools,” he said.

Kopp said as the average age of Nixa residents gets older and fewer babies are born in the area, the district must adjust.

“We’re trying to be level-headed and not do anything knee-jerk to this information,” Kopp said. “This is a prediction and it’s important for us to look at it and plan both ways, plan for growth and also plan for potential slow growth.”