More than 12,000 students attend private schools and live within the Fulton County Schools district, according to a staff report from the school district’s Operational Planning office.
The school district reported approximately 87,000 students were enrolled. The students enrolled in private schools comprise approximately 12% of the total number of students living within the Fulton County Schools attendance zones.
Private school administrators are required by state law to submit enrollment data to their students’ home school districts, according to a report submitted to the Fulton County Schools (FCS) Board of Education at its Jan. 14 work session.
An FCS spokesperson said private school enrollment is not on the rise. This year’s private school data shows an overall decline of 160 students as compared to last year.
The report said staff categorized the data according to FCS attendance boundaries and summarized it by school and grade level to better evaluate the impact of private school enrollment. The data is self-reported annually and reflects only the schools whose officials responded.
FCS told Rough Draft Atlanta that the north region has the highest private school enrollment, with 6,405 students. The Sandy Springs region has 3,875 students enrolled in private schools. The south region has 1,727 students enrolled in private schools, which is an increase of 10 students compared to last year.
More than 1,500 elementary school students in Sandy Springs attend private schools, according to the report. Students in the attendance zones for Heards Ferry (517) and High Point (430) accounted for 62% of that total. Spalding Drive, which has been recommended for closure due to declining enrollment, had 105 students who live within its zone attending private schools instead.
Ridgeview Middle School has more than double the number of these potential students attending private schools than Sandy Springs Charter Middle School. The report said parents of 678 students in the Ridgeview attendance zone and 307 students in the Sandy Springs Charter attendance zone chose to send their children to private school.
The two high schools in Sandy Springs lost 1,371 students to private schools, according to the private school report. Data showed North Springs had 491 students and Riverwood had 880 students sent to private schools who live within their attendance zones.
The private schools are only required to report student enrollment and not the reason parents chose to send their children to a private school, an FCS spokesperson said. Gathering that information would require further research or direct input from families to better understand their preferences and decisions.