West Virginia’s public schools enrollment continues to decline, down 2.5% since last year

by Amelia Ferrell Knisely, West Virginia Watch
November 13, 2025

West Virginia schools continue to lose students, a continuing problem that has contributed to a wave of proposed school closures and consolidations around the state. 

State Schools Superintendent Michele Blatt said schools have lost 2.5% of their students in the past year.

The state’s enrollment is now 234,957 students for this current school year, Blatt shared on Wednesday during a state Board of Education meeting.

“Fifty-three of 55 of our districts did decrease in enrollment this year,” Blatt said, noting only Tyler and Doddridge counties had an increase in student population.

A new West Virginia enrollment report showed a 6.5% decline from when the state had 250,899 students in the 2021-22 school year.

School officials have pointed to the state’s ongoing population decline as a major reason for the enrollment drop.

“There’s declining enrollment in our state as a whole and that’s affecting our school systems,” Blatt said.

West Virginia experienced the sharpest student population decline in the nation from 2020 to 2024, a time period that included the COVID-19 pandemic.  

Multiple school districts have proposed school closures or consolidations this year. Last week, the Roane County Board of Education voted to close two elementary and middle schools at the end of the 2025-26 school year. The county plans to consolidate students into other nearby schools. The state Board of Education will have to approve the plan. 

Roane County School Board President Jeff Mace said funding was part of the problem, MetroNews reported. He said the state’s school funding formula needs to be modernized and should focus more on the needs of students rather than student enrollment.

“I believe if we don’t invest in our education, we’re just going to continue to drive all of our young people and our young talent out of the state and we’re going to prevent people from coming in,” Mace said. 

State school board President Paul Hardesty has already called on state lawmakers to fix the school funding formula during the next legislative session to prevent more school closures in the rural state. 

According to the state Department of Education, 16 public schools closed in 2024.

Micah Whitlow, director of the West Virginia Department of Education’s Office of School Facilities, said that counties are making these decisions “based on real problems.”

“These things aren’t done on a whim or they just woke up one day thinking about this. Some of them are staff shortages, finances, deteriorating facilities. Some of these it’s all those things together,” he said.

Expired pandemic relief funding and students opting out of public schools to use the state’s broad school voucher program – The Hope Scholarship – have also put a financial strain on public schools. Around 19,000 students are using the voucher program this school year, typically at private religious schools. 

The enrollment report showed that public schools served 477 students using the Hope Scholarship; students using the Hope program can pay to take public school classes. Public schools also served 1,336 Hope Scholarship students that were not funded, according to the report. 

More than 4,000 children are attending virtual schools, which are considered public schools in West Virginia. Most of those students are enrolled in virtual charter schools. The state’s number of charter students has increased since the 2023-24 school year when 2,270 were enrolled.

Overall, most West Virginia students continue to be served in public schools as leaders grapple with financial issues, which can lead to less staff in schools.

“We can say that 98.2% of our students are still served in our public schools,” Blatt said. 

West Virginia Watch is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. West Virginia Watch maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Leann Ray for questions: info@westvirginiawatch.com.