2019-20 Hoboken City Schools ASSA Report- Observations and Discussion - Why Do Non-Low Income Families Leave?

Calabro School- Hoboken, NJ 

Every year all school districts submit data to the New Jersey Department of Education for inclusion for a report known as the Application for State School Aid (ASSA). This report is also sometimes referred to as the "October 15th Report" since the data submitted-- by directions from the NJDOE-- is for enrollment numbers as of October 15th of the school year. So, data collected as of October 15, 2018 becomes the data for the 2019-20 Application for State School Aid (ASSA).  The report includes a great deal of information such as number of students on roll in the traditional as well as charter schools (by Grade not by School), Full Day PreK-3YR and Full Day PreK-4YR enrollment, number of resident students, number of low income students, number of students in the "Choice Program" and much other useful data. Anyone wishing the actual report, please contact me-- I will be happy to send it to you. 

One analysis that I think is useful is the presentation of Hoboken City School District (traditional public school) enrollment by grade (K-12) on one axis and the percentage of low income and non low income on a secondary axis. This gives us a more global sense of student enrollment in the district across all grades as well as the changing demographics of the district from kindergarten to high school graduation. For consistency across years, I use Categories (02-14) on the ASSA report. I omit Special Education from the analysis because these students are only reported by grade band (Elementary, Middle, High) and not by individual grade. According to the 2019-20 ASSA Report there are 177 Special Education students in Elementary, 45 Special Education students in Middle, and 44 Special Education students in High. 

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Data: 2019-20 ASSA Report- Hoboken School District 

Observation 1: Enrollment in the 4th grade (125 students) is less than half of the enrollment in kindergarten (276 students). Why do over half of the families in Hoboken pull their children our of the traditional public schools by 4th grade? 

Observation 2: In kindergarten, over 80% of students are non-low income. By 6th grade this percentage falls to 36% and by graduation, only 25% of students are non-low income. Why can't the district keep non-low income students? 

Observation 3: Grades 9, 10, 11, and 12 enrollment (high school) is around 375 students. Nearly all "Choice" students are enrolled in these same grades. This indicates that if it were not for the addition of "Choice" students coming from out of town, the total student enrollment of Hoboken High School would be around 217 students. 

Observation 4: Despite over 80% of students coming from non-low income families in kindergarten, by the time high school graduation rolls around 75% of students come from families qualifying as low income. Why can't the Hoboken School District retain non-low income families? (this is a disturbing trend for the past decade or for the entire time that the Kids First/"Reform" group have been in control of the Hoboken School District). 

Observation 5: Enrollment is not "going through the roof" in the Hoboken City School District. There is some slight increase in PREK but many of these families are leaving the Hoboken public schools before enrolling in kindergarten and more leave during each grade up to the 4th grade. K-12 district enrollment has been fairly consistent and shows little/no upward trend at all. If fact, there is a slight downward trend. 

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Recent K-12 student enrollment: Hoboken City School District 

Observation 6: This may be one reason why families who have an option leave the Hoboken Public School: CLICK HERE An analysis by researchers at Stanford University shows clearly that the Hoboken Public Schools have the lowest growth rate in Hudson county, among the lowest growth rates in New Jersey, and among the lowest growth rates in the nation. It seems that parents who have options concerning their child's education are leveraging them. 

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2019-20 ASSA Report- Hoboken City School District