Projecting Enrollment in Rural Schools: A Study of Three Vermont School Districts

Autor/in	Grip, Richard S.
Titel	Projecting Enrollment in Rural Schools: A Study of Three Vermont School Districts
Quelle	In: Journal of Research in Rural Education, 19 (2004) 3, S.1-6 (6 Seiten) PDF als Volltext Verfügbarkeit
Sprache	englisch
Dokumenttyp	gedruckt; online; Zeitschriftenaufsatz
ISSN	1551-0670
Schlagwörter	School Districts; Rural Schools; Enrollment Projections; Enrollment Trends; Computation; Statistical Analysis; Research Methodology; Error of Measurement; Vermont + Suchen Sie Ihr Suchwort? School district; Schulbezirk; Rural area; Rural areas; School; Schools; Ländlicher Raum; Schule; Schulen; Statistische Analyse; Research method; Forschungsmethode; Messfehler
Abstract	Large numbers of rural districts have experienced sharp declines in enrollment, unlike their suburban counterparts. Accurate enrollment projections are required, whether a district needs to build new schools or consolidate existing ones. For school districts having more than 600 students, a quantitative method such as the Cohort-Survival Ratio (C-SR) can be employed with a high level of confidence. For districts having fewer than 600 students, enrollment projections using quantitative methods may have diminishing accuracy. In the present study, enrollment projections were performed for three rural school districts in Vermont with populations fewer than 600 students. The objectives were to determine if (a) the C-SR method can be a viable alternative for school planners, (b) a lower enrollment threshold for employing quantitative techniques can be established, and (c) the number of years used to develop the survival ratio affects the accuracy of the projections. To test the accuracy of the C-SR method, enrollments were calculated for school years 1997-1998 to 2001-2002 and were compared to actual enrollments. Percent error rates were calculated for each school district for the prediction time period. The results showed that the C-SR method can be used cautiously to project enrollments for rural districts in the short-term, 1 to 3 years into the future, but loses its effectiveness in long-range planning. In addition, the results showed that the C-SR method could be used reliably for districts with as few as 100 students, which is a significantly lower threshold than reported in the literature. (Contains 3 figures and 4 tables.) (Author).
Anmerkungen	College of Education and Human Development, 5766 Shibles Hall, The University of Maine, Orono, ME 04469-5766. Tel: 207-581-2761.
Erfasst von	ERIC (Education Resources Information Center), Washington, DC
Update	2017/4/10