Head Count: Enrollment Over Time Across Missouri, Kansas City Metro, and St. Louis Metro

By: Deanna Childress, Ph.D.

A comprehensive look at public school enrollment in Missouri, the Kansas City Metro Area and the St. Louis Metro Area.

Key Points:

• Charter schools in both the Kansas City and St. Louis metro areas have experienced notable growth over the last decade, while traditional public school enrollment has declined. Preliminary fall enrollment for the 2024-25 school year shows that some of these trends might be shifting.

• From 1991 through 2024:

• Public school enrollment has remained relatively stable over time across the state of Missouri over the last thirty years with a peak of 924,372 students during the 2002-03 school year.

• Enrollment in the Kansas City Metro area has been a generally positive trend, with enrollment increasing from 269,329 students in 1991 to 357,810 just before the pandemic. Peak enrollment was 357,874 in 2018 and declined after the COVID-19 pandemic, down to 347,373 students in 2023-24. 

• St. Louis Metro area enrollment has been on an overall downward trend, with enrollment peaking in 1998 at 449,719 students and gradually declining to 394,056 students in 2023-24, which is only 1.1% higher than the 1991 enrollment of 389,841 students. 

• Preliminary 2024-25 trends:

• Though traditional public school enrollment declined by 3.5% in Jackson County, MO (where Kansas City is located) from 2014 – 2024, preliminary 2024-25 enrollment represents a 0.1% increase from 2023-24.

• Along with this, the rapid increase in charter school enrollment in Jackson County, MO seems to have stalled: charter school enrollment increased by 30.3% from 2014 – 2024 but slowed to a 0.4% increase from 2023-24 – 2024-25.

• In St. Louis City and County (where charter schools operate in STL metro), traditional public school enrollment declined by 0.7% from 2023-24 – 2024-25, following a decline of -9.3% from 2014 – 2024. 

• Simultaneously, charter school enrollment increased by 2.6% from 2023-24 to 2024-25, following an increase of 22.8% from 2014 – 2024.

Please Cite As: Childress, D. (2025). Enrollment over time across Missouri, Kansas City metro and St Louis. Policy Research in Missouri Education, 7(9). Saint Louis University. www.primecenter.org/education-reports-database/enrollment