West Central Reporter

Cass County schools welcomed 1,939 students in the 2023-24 school year, according to the Illinois State Board of Education.

This is a decrease of 19.1% from the previous school year, when there were 2,398 students enrolled in the county.

Cass County had the 29th lowest enrollment numbers in the state.

Of all the students welcomed at the time, 52.6% identified as male, and 47.4% as female.

The most represented ethnicity among Cass County students was white, making up about 48.5% of all the students.

Within Cass County, Beardstown Junior/Senior High School had the highest enrollment in the school year, welcoming 814 students.

As of the 2023-24 school year, Illinois public schools enrolled approximately 1.85 million students across nearly 4,000 schools. There was roughly one teacher for every 15 students, slightly better than the national average of 1:16.

K-12 enrollment has been declining in Illinois for many years, reflecting the state's demographic changes. Between the 2019–20 and 2022–23 school years, Illinois public school enrollment declined from approximately 1.98 million to 1.85 million students, a decrease of about 127,000 students or 6.4%. This decline is significantly higher than the typical annual decreases of 0.5% to 1.5% observed in the preceding years, reflecting broader demographic shifts within the state.

School	City	Enrollment
A-C Central Elementary School	Chandlerville	129
A-C Central High School	Ashland	101
A-C Central Middle School	Ashland	91
Beardstown Junior/Senior High School	Beardstown	814
Gard Elementary School	Beardstown	484
Virginia Elementary School	Virginia	184
Virginia Junior and Senior High School	Virginia	136