News

The following is our newsletter that was distributed in November 2011 to inform and educate school administrators on the process of performing enrollment projections and other topics related to school demography.

Now that the housing boom has ended, I am beginning to see declining enrollment for a number of school districts in New Jersey.  The cause of the decline is typically traced to a sharp drop in the town’s birth rate.  The question becomes:  Is the decline due to women having fewer babies (lower fertility rate) or are there less women in the childbearing age group (typically defined as ages 15-49)?

While fertility rates have certainly dropped in some communities as people are delaying having a child due to the uncertain economy, I will save that topic for a future newsletter.  Instead, I am going to look at the decline in the percent of women in the 20-34 age group, which is the age segment where the greatest number of births typically occurs.

In the last newsletter, I studied vacancy data from Morris County, so in the essence of fairness, this newsletter will analyze data from the communities of Mercer County.

In the maps following which I created using a mapping software program, I show the percentage of women aged 20-34 for each community in Mercer County for 2010 and the change since 2000.  Scroll to the end if you would like to see each community’s data from 2000 and 2010 from the Census Bureau.

The decline in this particular age group is not unique to Mercer County.  In short, we are a graying country.  In the last 10 years, the percentage of women aged 20-34 has declined from 20.2% to 19.8% in the United States.  The decline is greater in New Jersey: 19.2% in 2000 as compared to 18.1% in 2010.

Why are there fewer women in this age group in some towns in New Jersey? A lot of it has to do with the expensive home prices.  People in this age group typically cannot purchase an expensive home as they are just beginning, or are a few years into, their careers.

Ignoring Princeton Borough, which is affected by the presence of Princeton University students, Robbinsville and Hightstown have had the greatest declines over the last ten years.  Of the 13 communities, only five had gains, with Ewing having the largest gain.

It would be interesting to see if the towns that have percentages less than the state average are having declining enrollment.  That will have to wait for a future newsletter.

Richard S. Grip Ed.D.

                                                                Note: Value is bolded if below the state average.

Send mail to richardsgrip@gmail.com with questions or comments about this web site.