NATIONAL CENTER FOR EDUCATION STATISTICS

Statistical Analysis Report May 1997

Characteristics of Small and 

Rural School Districts 

U.S. Department of Education

Office of Educational Research and Improvement NCES 97-529
NATIONAL CENTER FOR EDUCATION STATISTICS

 Statistical Analysis Report May 1997

Characteristics of Small and

Rural School Districts

Donald H. McLaughlin

Mette B. Huberman

Evelyn K. Hawkins

American Institutes for Research

Lee M. Hoffman, Project Officer

National Center for Education Statistics

U.S. Department of Education

Office of Educational Research and Improvement NCES 97-529
U.S. Department of Education

Richard W. Riley

Secretary

Office of Educational Research and Improvement

Marshall S. Smith

Acting Assistant Secretary

National Center for Education Statistics

Pascal D. Forgione, Jr.

Commissioner

The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) is the primary federal entity for collecting, analyzing,

and reporting data related to education in the United States and other nations. It fulfills a congressional

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National Center for Education Statistics

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May 1997

Contact:

Lee M. Hoffman

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Table of Contents

List of Figures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . iii

List of Tables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii

Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xii

Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii

1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

Data Sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Definitions of Terms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

2 Small Public School Districts in America's Rural Locales . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Background ............................................................9

Small Rural Districts in 1993-94 ............................................9

Trends in Small Rural Districts from 1986-87 to 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

3 Characteristics of Schools in Small Rural School Districts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Schools in Small Rural Districts in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Trends in Schools in Small Rural Districts from 1986-87 to 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

4 Characteristics of Students in Small Rural School Districts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39

Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Students in Small Rural Districts in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

Trends in Student Populations in Small Rural Districts from 1986-87 to 1993-94 . . . . . 50

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54

5 Revenues, Expenditures, and Student/Teacher Ratios in Small Rural School

Districts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

Background . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

Revenues, Expenditures, and Student/Teacher Ratios in Small Rural School 

 Districts in 1992-93 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Trends in Revenues, Expenditures, and Student/Teacher Ratios in Small Rural 

 School Districts between 1989-90 and 1992-93 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
ii

Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

Appendix A: Tables Section . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75

Appendix B: Technical Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
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List of Figures

Figure 2.1— Total numbers of small and large public school districts in rural and nonrural 

areas in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Figure 2.2— Percentages of districts that were both small and in rural locations, by state, in 

1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

Figure 2.3— Average enrollment size of school districts in rural and nonrural locations in 

1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Figure 2.4— Percentages of elementary, secondary, and unified districts that were in rural 

locations in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Figure 2.5— Total numbers of students in elementary, secondary, and unified districts in 

rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Figure 2.6— Percentages of elementary, secondary, and unified districts in rural and 

nonrural areas that were small in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Figure 2.7— Cumulative numbers of small and large school district closures between 

1986-87 and 1993-94 in rural and nonrural areas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Figure 2.8— Cumulative net losses in numbers of small and large school districts between 

1986-87 and 1993-94 in rural and nonrural areas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Figure 2.9— Cumulative net losses in numbers of small rural school districts between 

1986-87 and 1993-94, by region . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

Figure 2.10— Cumulative net gains in numbers of students enrolled in small and large 

school districts in rural and nonrural locations, between 1986-87 and 

1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Figure 2.11— Cumulative net losses in numbers of elementary, secondary, and unified small 

rural school districts, between 1986-87 and 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Figure 2.12— Increases in average enrollment sizes of small and large elementary school 

districts in rural and nonrural locations, between 1986-87 and 1993-94 . . . . . . . 18

Figure 3.1— Total numbers of schools in small and large districts in rural and nonrural 

areas in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24
iv

Figure 3.2— Percentages of schools in elementary, secondary, and unified districts that are 

in small and large districts in rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . 24

Figure 3.3— Average number of schools in elementary, secondary, and unified districts 

that are in small and large districts in rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94 . . . . . 25

Figure 3.4— Percentages of schools that were small or very small, in small and large 

districts in rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

Figure 3.5— Percentages of schools that were small or very small, in elementary, 

secondary, and unified small, rural districts in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

Figure 3.6— Percentages of schools that were small and rural, in small and large districts in 

rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Figure 3.7— Percentages of schools that offered various grade levels, in small and large 

districts in rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Figure 3.8— Percentages of elementary and combined schools that offered kindergarten, 

and the percentage of these that offered prekindergarten, in small and large 

districts in rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Figure 3.9— Percentages of nonregular schools and schools offering ungraded instruction, 

in small and large districts in rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Figure 3.10— Cumulative net gains and losses of schools in small and large districts in rural 

and nonrural areas between 1986-87 and 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

Figure 3.11— Cumulative net gains and losses of schools in elementary, secondary, and 

unified small rural and other districts between 1986-87 and 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . 32

Figure 3.12— Cumulative net gains or losses of very small schools, in elementary, 

secondary, and unified small rural and other districts from 1986-87 

to 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Figure 3.13— Net percentage gains and losses of schools that offered various grade levels, 

in small and large districts in rural and nonrural areas between 1986-87 and 

1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Figure 3.14— Cumulative percentage gains of schools enrolling prekindergarten students in 

small and large districts in rural and nonrural areas between 1986-87 and 

1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
v

Figure 3.15— Trends in percentages of schools offering ungraded instruction, in small and 

large districts in rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

Figure 3.16— Trends in percentages of nonregular schools, in small and large districts in 

rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

Figure 4.1— Percentages of minority students in small rural and other school districts in 

1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Figure 4.2— Numbers of small rural and other school districts in which a majority of 

students were members of minorities, in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Figure 4.3— Percentages of minority students who were in districts in which a majority 

of students were members of minorities, in small rural and other school 

districts in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Figure 4.4— Percentages of Native American, Hispanic, Asian, and African American

students in small rural and other school districts in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

Figure 4.5— Percentages of school-aged children with limited English proficiency in small 

rural and other school districts in 1990-91 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

Figure 4.6— Percentages of school-aged children with limited English proficiency in

small rural and other school districts in 1990-91, by region . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46

Figure 4.7— Percentages of students with Individualized Education Programs in small rural 

and other school districts in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

Figure 4.8— Estimated percentages of students in poverty in small rural and other school 

districts in 1993-94, by region . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Figure 4.9— Percentages of students in small rural and other districts who are in the 

highest and lowest quarters of districts, ranked on poverty percentage, in 

1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Figure 4.10— Percentage of minority students in small rural and other school districts, 

1987-88 to 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51

Figure 4.11— Percentage of minority students in small rural and other school districts, 

1987-88 and 1993-94, by racial-ethnic group . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52

Figure 4.12— Percentage of students with Individualized Education Programs in small rural 

and other school districts, 1987-88 to 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
vi

Figure 5.1— Average per-pupil revenues in small rural and other school districts, in 

1992-93 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

Figure 5.2— Average per-pupil expenditures in small rural and other school districts, in 

1992-93 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

Figure 5.3— Percentages of students in small rural and other school districts with low, 

medium, and high per-pupil revenues in 1992-93 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

Figure 5.4— Percentages of students in small rural and other school districts with low, 

medium, and high per-pupil expenditures in 1992-93 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

Figure 5.5— Percentages of revenues in small rural and other school districts from local, 

state, and federal sources in 1992-93 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

Figure 5.6— Percentages of expenditures in small rural and other school districts for core 

instruction, administrative support, and capital outlays, in 1992-93 . . . . . . . . . . 63

Figure 5.7— Average student/teacher ratios in small rural and other school districts in 

1992-93 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

Figure 5.8— Average student/teacher ratios in small rural and other school districts with 

low, medium, and high per-pupil revenues in 1992-93 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

Figure 5.9— Average student/teacher ratios in small rural and other school districts with 

low, medium, and high per-pupil expenditures in 1992-93 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

Figure 5.10— Trends in per-pupil revenues in small rural and other school districts between 

1989-1990 and 1992-93 (in constant 1992-93 dollars) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

Figure 5.11— Trends in per-pupil expenditures in small rural and other school districts 

between 1989-90 and 1992-93 (in constant 1992-93 dollars) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67

Figure 5.12— Trends in student/teacher ratios in small rural and other school districts 

between 1986-87 and 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68

Figure B1— Schema for classification of schools by grades served . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
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List of Tables

Table 3.1— Percentages of rural and nonrural districts, by enrollment per grade in

largest high school, in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28

Table 4.1— Percentages of racial-ethnic groups enrolled in small rural districts, 

compared to other districts, in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44

Table 4.2— Percentages of students enrolled in small rural districts, by region and 

racial-ethnic group in 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

Table 5.1— Per-pupil revenues and expenditures in small rural districts, compared to all 

other districts, by region, in 1992-93 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

Table 5.2— Per-pupil revenues and expenditures in small rural districts, compared to 

all other districts, by grade level served, in 1992-93 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62

Table 5.3— Per-pupil expenditure gains in small rural districts, compared to all other 

districts, by region, from 1989-90 to 1992-93 (in constant 1992-93 dollars) . . 67
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List of Appendix Tables and Figures

Table A2.1— Number of rural, small, and other school districts, by level and year . . . . . . . . 77

Table A2.2— Number of students (in thousands) enrolled in rural, small, and other school 

districts, by level and year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78

Table A2.3a— Number of rural, small, and other school districts, by region and year . . . . . . 79

Table A2.3b— Counts of small rural and other districts at each grade level . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 80

Table A2.4a— Number of rural, small, and other school districts in 1993-94, by state . . . . . . 81

Table A2.4b— Percentage of rural, small, and other school districts in 1993-94, by state . . . . 82

Table A2.4c— Percent change in rural, small, and other school districts between 1986 and 

1993, by state . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83

Table A2.5— Number of rural, small, and other school district consolidations, by region 

and year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84

Table A2.6— Number of rural, small, and other school district consolidations between 1986 

and 1993, by state . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

Table A3.1— Number of schools in rural, small, and other school districts, by level and 

year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86

Table A3.2— Number of small schools in rural, small, and other school districts, by level 

and year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

Table A3.3— Number of small rural schools in rural, small, and other school districts, by 

level and year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88

Table A3.4— Number of regular and non-regular schools in rural, small, and other school 

districts, by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 89

Table A3.5— Number of combined (K-12), elementary, intermediate, secondary, and 

ungraded/other schools in rural, small, and other school districts in 1986-87 

and 1993-94 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90

Table A3.6— Number of schools with kindergarten and ungraded classes in rural, small, and 

other school districts, by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
ix

Table A3.7— Number of small schools with fewer than one teacher per grade, by level . . . . 92

Table A3.8— Patterns of school levels in small rural districts, by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93

Table A3.9— Counts of year-to-year school level changes in small rural districts . . . . . . . . . 94

Table A3.10— Counts of year-to-year school level changes in small rural districts with 

increasing or declining enrollment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 95

Table A4.1a— Number of minority and white students in rural, small, and other school 

districts, by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96

Table A4.1b— Percentage of minority and white students in rural, small, and other school 

districts, by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97

Table A4.1c— Number of black, Hispanic, Asian, and Native American students (in 

thousands) in rural, small, and other school districts, by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98

Table A4.1d— Percentage of black, Hispanic, Asian, and Native American students in 

rural, small, and other school districts, by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99

Table A4.1e— Number of low, medium, or high minority rural, small, and other districts, 

by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100

Table A4.1f— Minority enrollment in low, medium, or high minority rural, small, and 

other school districts, by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 101

Table A4.1g— Percent minority enrollment by region in rural, small, and other school 

districts, by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102

Table A4.2a— Number of students (in thousands) with IEPs in rural, small, and other 

school districts, by level and year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103

Table A4.2b— Percentage of students with IEPs in rural, small, and other school districts, 

by level and year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

Table A4.3— Percentage of LEP students in rural, small, and other school districts in 

1990, by region . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105

Table A4.4— Percentage of children in poverty in rural, small, and other school districts, 

by region and year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106
x

Table A4.5a— Student enrollment in high, medium, and low poverty rural, small, and 

other school districts, by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 107

Table A4.5b— Percentage distributions of student enrollment in high, medium, and low 

poverty rural, small, and other school districts, by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108

Table A5.1— Student/teacher ratios in rural, small, and other school districts, by level 

and year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109

Table A5.2— Per-pupil revenues in rural, small, and other school districts, by level and 

year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110

Table A5.3a— Per-pupil revenues in rural, small, and other school districts, by region . . . . 111

Table A5.3b— Per-pupil revenues in rural, small, and other school districts, by state in 

1992 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112

Table A5.4— Percentage of local, state, and federal revenues in rural, small, and other 

school districts by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113

Table A5.5— Percentage of students enrolled in low, medium, and high per-pupil 

revenue districts in rural, small, and other school districts, by year . . . . . . . . 114

Table A5.6— Student/teacher ratios in low, medium, and high per-pupil revenue districts 

in rural, small, and other school districts, by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115

Table A5.7— Per-pupil expenditures in rural, small, and other school districts, by level 

and year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116

Table A5.8a— Per-pupil expenditures in rural, small, and other school districts, by 

region . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117

Table A5.8b— Per-pupil expenditures by state in rural, small, and other school districts, 

by state in 1992 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118

Table A5.9— Percentage of expenditures for core instruction, administrative support, 

and capital outlay in rural, small, and other school districts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119

Table A5.10— Percentage of students in low, medium, and high per-pupil expenditure 

districts, by year . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120

Table A5.11— Student/teacher ratios in low, medium, and high per-pupil expenditure 

districts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121
xi

Table B1— Number of small rural districts and large rural districts with a majority of 

small schools in 1993-94, by state . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127

Table B2— Percentages of values imputed on the district files used in the small rural 

district report . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
xii

Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank all those who contributed to the production of this report. Among

staff of the John C. Flanagan Research Center, American Institutes for Research, special mention

goes to Grace Wu and Andrew Davis for their capable production of tables; and to Shannon

Daugherty for her editorial assistance. Also, Tom Parrish’s review of the chapter on school finance

is greatly appreciated. Thanks also must go to Alan DeYoung, of the University of Kentucky, for

his careful review of methodology and of the description of findings.

The NCES project officer, Lee Hoffman, provided insightful guidance on the purposes of this

report and on its audiences, for which the authors are grateful. The authors also gratefully

acknowledge the comments and suggestions of the NCES reviewers: Robert Burton, William

Fowler, and Marilyn McMillen. In addition, the report's adjudicators, including Michael Ross and

Edith McArthur of NCES, Larry Case, of the Office of Vocational and Adult Education, and Craig

Howley and Hobart Harmon of Appalachia Educational Laboratory, provided valuable suggestions

for final revisions. 
xiii

Characteristics of Small and Rural School Districts

Executive Summary

Overview

All public school districts in the country provide basic information to the Common Core

of Data (CCD), whose files are maintained by the National Center for Education Statistics. This

report makes use of CCD to examine the status of small rural school districts in 1993-94 and the

processes of change in those districts over the period from 1986-87 to 1993-94. 

Small rural districts constitute a major portion of the public elementary and secondary

sector of education. In 1993-94, half of the 15,000 regular public school districts in America

were rural, and the majority of these were small, averaging fewer than 100 students per high

school grade and 25 students per elementary grade (figure 2.1 in the report). One-fourth of the

districts in the nation were small and rural, and in the Midwest, South Central, and West, this

proportion was more than one-third (table A2.3a). However, only one in every 40 students in the

nation attended schools in small rural districts. The majority of small rural districts, like other

districts, were unified (K-12) districts, but one-third were separate elementary or secondary

districts (table A2.1).

Small rural districts are declining in numbers, however. Between 1986-87 and 1993-94,

the number of regular public school districts in the nation decreased by 700, and 415 of these

were small rural districts, whose enrollments were folded into adjacent districts (figure 2.8). 

This represented a net loss of 1 in 11 small rural districts in this period. Closures of small rural

districts were most prevalent in the Midwest (figure 2.9); and most small rural district closures

were elementary (K-8) districts (table A2.1). Contrasted with the declining numbers of districts,

total enrollment increased slightly in small rural districts (figure 2.10). As a result, in small rural

districts that were in existence all 8 years, the average enrollment grew by 9 percent between

1986-87 and 1993-94.

Schools in Small Rural Districts

In 1993-94, about 8,000 of the nation’s 84,000 public schools were located in small rural

districts (figure 3.1). Most small rural elementary districts operated a single school, while small

rural secondary and unified districts usually had 2 or 3 schools (figure 3.3). Rural schools are

generally small. High schools in four-fifths of all rural districts had fewer than 100 students per

grade (table 3.1). Some of the schools in small rural districts were very small: a fifth of the

schools in small rural districts had fewer than one teacher per grade (figure 3.4), including

64 percent of the elementary schools (figure 3.5). There were relatively few intermediate schools

and many combined (K-12) schools in these districts (figure 3.7). About a quarter of the schools

serving primary grades offered prekindergarten, similar to findings in other types of districts
xiv

(figure 3.8). Finally, relatively few small rural districts either offered ungraded instruction or

operated alternative, vocational, or special education schools (figure 3.9). 

Between 1986-87 and 1993-94, about 415 schools closed their doors as the small rural

districts in which they operated closed, and 315 more were assimilated into consolidated

districts. Even in small rural districts that continued to operate, there was a net closure of 92

schools. There was a tendency for small rural districts to add intermediate schools, but there was

a net loss of separate elementary and high schools in these districts (figure 3.13). The number of

schools in small rural districts enrolling prekindergarten students more than doubled during this

period (figure 3.14), while the number offering ungraded instruction declined (figure 3.15).

Students in Small Rural Districts

In 1993-94, about 1,100,000 of the nation’s 43,200,000 public school students were

enrolled in small rural districts. More of the students in small rural districts were either white or

Native American than elsewhere, while fewer were Asian or African American (table 4.1). Few

school-aged children in small or rural districts (1.3 percent) were reported as having limited

English proficiency (figure 4.6); however, slightly more of the students in small rural districts

than elsewhere were reported to have Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) to address

special educational needs (11.5 percent) (figure 4.7). In the South and West, but not in other

regions, relatively more of the children in small rural districts were living in poverty (table 4.8). 

During the latter part of the period from 1986-87 to 1993-94, enrollments increased in

small rural districts, although not as fast as elsewhere. Although percentages of minority

enrollment increased by 10 percent overall (from 31 percent to 34 percent of all public school

students), they remained virtually constant in small rural districts, at about 12 percent (table

A4.1b). While the percentage of Native Americans in small rural districts grew, the percentages

of Asians and African Americans in these districts declined (figure 4.11). Finally, from 1987-88

to 1993-94, there was a gradual increase in the proportion of students with Individualized

Education Programs (IEPs) in small rural districts, as well as in other types of districts (figure

4.12).

Revenue and Expenditures in Small Rural Districts

In the nation as a whole, there were no substantial discrepancies in per-pupil revenues and

expenditures between small rural districts and other districts; however, revenues and

expenditures were substantially lower in large rural districts. In 1992-93, revenue per pupil in

small rural districts was about $6,200, and expenditures per pupil were about $6,000. This was

about $200 to $400 more than in large nonrural districts (figures 5.1, 5.2). However, per-pupil

revenue and expenditures were only about $5,200 in large rural districts. Per-pupil spending

varied substantially between regions: most notably in the West, where small rural districts spent

nearly $2,000 more per pupil more than other districts did (table 5.1). 
xv

Nearly half the revenue in small rural districts came, each, from local and state sources,

with about 7 percent from the federal government (figure 5.5). In large rural districts, by

comparison, a much smaller share came from local sources. About two-thirds of the current

expenditures in small rural districts were for core instruction, slightly less than elsewhere (figure

5.6). Nevertheless, ratios of students to teachers were lowest in small rural districts, ranging

from 12 in top quartile spending districts to 15 in bottom quartile spending districts (figure 5.9).

Adjusted for inflation, finance trends between 1989-90 and 1992-93 were minor,

although there were a few patterns. The slightly greater spending in small rural districts,

compared to other districts in 1992-93, was more noticeable than it was 3 years earlier (figure

5.11). In the South Central region, per-pupil revenues in small rural districts rose, but in the

Northeast, per-pupil expenditures declined somewhat (table 5.3). In the nation as a whole,

however, no substantial trends in per-pupil revenue or expenditures or in student/teacher ratios

characterized small rural districts.
 The standard NCES definition of “rural,” based on Census-defined locales of schools in a district, was 1

used; and “small” districts were those with enrollment averaging fewer than 25 students per elementary grade and

fewer than 100 students per secondary grade served, in 1987-88 or the first year of operation if that was later than

1987-88.

 There were additional school districts on the CCD file, not included in this report. However, they were 2

either non-regular school districts or districts with no students. In 1993-94, for example, 1,717 districts were

excluded for this report. Of these, 5 were in outlying territories (enrolling an aggregate 707,507 students); and the

remainder either enrolled no students (330), were nonregular (409), or both (956), or had undefined grade spans

(17). Although there are no definitive data on which nonregular districts were rural, of 409 nonregular districts, such

as regional units or administrative components of supervisory unions, enrolling 165,322 students, 201, enrolling

37,724 students, were not in Metropolitan Statistical Areas.

1

1. Introduction

While most of the population of the United States lives in urban settings, millions of citizens

live in vast rural areas. This diversity has important implications for public schooling, not only in

terms of goals of schools and characteristics of the community but also in terms of logistics. School

districts must serve a sufficiently large population to obtain funding to enable purchasing of

resources, hiring teachers, and offering a range of courses and services. However, when the

population is widely dispersed, districts face problems with keeping the community involved,

transporting students over great distance, and maintaining small schools.

Using accepted, common sense definitions of “small enrollment” and “rural setting,” more 1

than 1 in 4 of the 14,648 regular public elementary and secondary school districts in the United

States were small districts in rural settings in the 1993-94 school year, although only 1 in 40 of the 2

nation’s 43 million public school students attended schools in these districts. In order to provide

information on the characteristics of this substantial segment of American education, the National

Center for Education Statistics (NCES) has developed this summary report, based on information

about small rural districts contained in the Common Core of Data. This report focuses on the 4,000

small rural districts operating since 1986-87, their status in 1993-94, and how they changed each year

from 1986-87 to 1993-94, drawing comparisons where appropriate to larger districts and districts

in nonrural (urban and suburban) settings. 

Four sections summarize information concerning, respectively, (1) the geographic

distribution of small rural districts, (2) the characteristics of schools in these districts, (3) the

characteristics of students in these districts, and (4) revenues and expenditures in these districts. The

first section focuses on the district as a unit and presents information on such matters as the total

numbers of small rural districts, where they are located, how many students are enrolled, and their

rate of closure and consolidation.

The second section focuses on schools in small rural districts, how many schools are in each

district, how small they are, what grade levels they serve, and how many of them were closed

between 1986-87 and 1993-94.
 Regular public school districts divide the nation into about 14,000 generally nonoverlapping areas. In 3

some cases, however, separate elementary and secondary districts serve the same community.

2

The third section looks at the students attending schools in small rural districts. The focus

in this section is on racial and ethnic distributions, percentages of Limited English Proficient (LEP)

children and students with Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) under the Individuals with

Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), and percentages of children in poverty. 

Finally, in the fourth section the focus is on revenues and expenditures: their sources, how

they are used, and their translation into student/teacher ratios.

Full tabulations of means and percentages are shown in 45 tables in appendix A. The tables

are numbered according to the chapter in the report in which their contents are discussed.

Data Sources

The primary sources of data for these analyses are the NCES Common Core of Data (CCD)

School and Education Agency Surveys for the years 1986-87 to 1993-94. These data were merged

with the decennial 1990 U.S. Census information mapped to school district boundaries (the School

District Data Book) and the Bureau of Census F-33 Survey of Local Governments for the years

1989-90 to 1992-93. CCD data were edited to create a consistent longitudinal file for this report,

and missing data in these files were imputed. For districts whose CCD records were missing one

or more fields in a year or had unreasonable values based on comparisons to other years or other

fields, values were imputed statistically. In most cases, these imputations were based on the

districts’ responses in other years. Details of this process are described in Appendix B.

Definitions of Terms

A common definitional framework is needed for discussions about schools in rural areas.

Past studies have used several alternative units of analysis to discuss public education in rural areas,

most commonly schools, school districts, or counties. Although schools are the final delivery point

for education and counties are a relatively stable government whose boundaries do not overlap, the

school district is the primary unit of concern in most educational policy matters (Stephens 1988).

School districts are local, relatively stable over time, and the agencies most directly responsible to 3

the citizens of the community for educating its children. They are the basic unit selected for

attention in this report. 

It is important to note that focusing on small rural districts is not the same as looking at small

schools in rural settings. In this report, a district’s “ruralness” depends on the proportion of its

schools that are in rural locales. Thus, a small school located in a rural section of a large district with

some urban areas would not be included in this report. For example, in 1993-94, there were

approximately 9,500 small rural schools in the United States, but only about 6,000 of these schools

were in small rural districts. Rural districts are also different from rural counties: although there are
3

many countywide districts in the nation, only about 100 of the 4,000 small rural districts are

countywide districts.

 

Definition of Rural School Districts. The meaningfulness of the findings in this report

depends on where the line is drawn between "rural" and "nonrural" school districts. If "rural" is

defined too broadly, then it becomes a diffuse concept including all but the districts in metropolitan

areas. If defined too narrowly, it may omit districts which a consensus would agree are rural. A

categorization is needed which will bring the differences between rural and nonrural districts into

sharp focus. 

Before 1900, when the United States was mainly an agrarian society, “rural” simply meant

a farming community. At that time, most of the population attended rural schools. But by 1918, the

urban population had exceeded that of the population in rural areas, and it became important to

attend to the educational problems facing rural communities. However, it also became clear that

there was no single “rural” school district type (Stern 1994). In its decennial survey, the Census

Bureau has defined “rural” as a residual category of places “outside urbanized areas in open country,

or in communities with less than 2,500 inhabitants,” or where the population density is “less than

1,000 inhabitants per square mile.” The data used for the CCD categorization of school locales are

based on the 1980 Census.

 

NCES has applied this concept of a rural setting to individual schools, based on the addresses

of the schools. In this report, a school district is defined as rural based on the locale codes (see

Appendix B) assigned to the schools operated by the district. Essentially, according to NCES's

standard definition, a school district is called rural if that is the most common school locale; that is,

if more schools in the district were located in rural locales than in any of the other six categories of

locale (small and large towns, mid-size and large central cities, and fringes of mid-size and large

cities). By this definition, in 1993-94, 45 percent of the nation's regular public school districts were

rural. If districts with small town locales had been added to the set, 73 percent of all districts would

have been included. To avoid diffusion of the concept of rural districts, small town districts were

not considered rural in this report.

Definition of Small School Districts. The meaningfulness of the findings in this report also

depends on where the line is drawn between "small" districts and districts that are not to be

considered small. Although the size of the geographic area served by a school district imposes

constraints on the services to that must be provided, the single measure of size that is most relevant

to district operation is enrollment, or membership. In 1993-94, the median enrollment in regular

public school districts was 1,000 students, and one quarter of the districts had fewer than 350

students. Because the purpose of this report is to focus on small rural districts, not all rural districts,

a criterion threshold for enrollment that distinguishes districts whose smallness creates constraints

on operation is needed. 

Total enrollment does not provide the best indicator of being small because some districts

serve only elementary or only secondary grades. A K-6 district that serves 350 students might not

be considered small, because it has 50 students at each grade level and even as few as 20 or 30 are

sufficient to make maximal use of an elementary school teacher. However, a K-12 district with 500
4

students might be considered small because it would have only about 40 students in each high school

grade, too few to offer a sufficiently broad range of course choices. Conant (1959) developed a

widely accepted criterion that the size of the graduating class in a high school should be at least 100

to support a quality educational program. 

In this report, a small district is defined as one having fewer students in membership than the

sum of (a) 25 students per grade in the elementary grades it offers (usually K-8) and (b) 100 students

per grade in the secondary grades it offers (usually 9-12). Therefore, a district’s classification as

“small” depends upon both the total number of students it serves and the grade levels it offers. Many

comparisons in this report are made between districts that are small and ones that are not small. In

those cases, the term “large” is sometimes used. However, it should be made clear that when the

term “large” is applied to school districts in this report, it is an abbreviation for “not small.”

In 1993-94, as shown by the counts in table A2.1 in appendix A, 54 percent of the 3,334

elementary districts in the nation were small by this definition of "small," compared to 41 percent

of the 631 secondary districts and 28 percent of the 10,638 unified districts. Among rural districts,

60 percent were small.

This definition of “small” is meaningful in terms of staffing constraints faced by districts, but

it is somewhat skewed for unified districts because, although the threshold is different for elementary

and secondary grades, actual enrollments within a district tend to be similar for all grades. Unified

(usually K-12) districts are defined as small, as are other districts, by the comparison of their total

enrollment to the sum of 25 per elementary grade and 100 per secondary grade; this creates a

threshold for definition of a K-12 district as “small” of 625 in total enrollment, or about 50 students

per grade. A unified district with 780 students, which would be expected to have about 60 students

per grade, would not be defined as small, although its high school enrollment, taken separately,

might well be fewer than 100 per grade. For purposes that would focus on the secondary grade

criterion for "smallness," a parallel set of analyses were also carried out with an expanded definition

of "small" that included all unified districts with fewer than 100 students per secondary grade (9-12).

In 1993-94, 50 percent of the nation's unified districts were small by this definition; and among all

rural districts, 80 percent were small. The results are summarized in Appendix B. 

In addition, in several states, especially in the southeastern region of the country, all of the

small rural schools have been consolidated into large, in many cases countywide, districts. Using

the primary definitions for rural and small, although more than a quarter of the districts in Alabama,

Delaware, Louisiana, Maryland, North Carolina, and West Virginia are rural, there are no small rural

school districts in these states. These small schools in large rural districts are, by definition, not

included in the picture of small rural districts, although they face many of the same challenges that

schools in small rural districts do. To broaden the picture of small rural public education in

America, analyses of small rural districts for this report were repeated including “large rural districts

with a majority of small schools” along with small rural districts. Although this resulted in virtually

no qualitative changes in the statements in the report, footnotes indicating differences appear at the

end of each chapter. 
5

Regions. For the purposes of this report, some results are presented for separate regions of

the United States. The standard four-region breakdown used by the National Center for Education

Statistics has been altered to reflect unusual state-by-state diversity in the southern region: three

states, Texas, Arkansas, and Oklahoma, are presented as a separate “south central” region. In 1993-

94, these three states had 815 small rural districts, compared to a total of 16 in the thirteen other

states in the standard southern region. Because it would be misleading to label results based almost

entirely on those three states as referring to the entire southern region, a five-region categorization

is used. The state-by-state regional categorization is specified in Appendix B.

Longitudinal Measurement. There was attrition of roughly 1 percent of the regular public

school districts each year between 1986-87 and 1993-94, so that in any year about 99 percent of the

public school districts were the same ones that existed in the preceding year. Therefore, the CCD

universe file can be used for longitudinal studies of the ways in which individual districts changed

from year to year. However, the possibility of ambiguity arises when housing developments move

into formerly rural areas and enrollments rise above the threshold for defining “small,” or when an

exodus of families seeking new jobs causes a district to become small. A choice must be made

whether (a) to report the progress of districts once called small and rural or (b) to report on the

characteristics of districts that are small and rural each year. 

Viewing the progress of districts defined once as small and rural leads to different

conclusions from those that follow from a cross-sectional view. For example, if we wish to

determine whether enrollment increased or decreased in small rural districts over time, the trend

would be hidden if those districts that crossed the threshold from “small” to “not small” when they

gained students were, as a result, not counted in the enrollments in small districts after that. Trends

in school closures, in revenues and expenditures per student, and in student/teacher ratios would be

similarly distorted if districts that were counted as small and rural in one year were counted as

nonrural or nonsmall in another year. 

Although cross-sectional counts are also valuable, many questions about change cannot be

addressed without a constant classification of the units of analysis. In order to provide an

unambiguous definition for the examination of changes in small rural school districts over time, each

district in the data set was defined once as small and rural, using locale in 1990 and enrollment and

grade span in 1987-88 (or in a few cases, in the first year of its existence). In this way, trends in

small rural district characteristics are descriptive of events occurring in those districts. For example,

the finding (see chapter 2) that the net loss of small rural districts during this period was greatest in

the Midwest is a meaningful description of district closures because none of this net loss can be

attributed to the growth of districts out of the small category in the Midwest.

There were many consolidations of small rural districts during the period; and as a result,

there was a net loss of 415 small rural districts between 1986-87 and 1993-94. Therefore, the

specific districts included in tables in this report differ over the years. As described in appendix B,

an attempt was made to link closing districts to the districts with which they merged, based on

geographic location and enrollment changes. Although this attempt was only partially successful,

it was clear that nearly all regular districts added to the CCD file between 1986-87 and 1993-94 were

created from the consolidations of other districts; that is, they were not really “new” districts. Only
6

a handful of “new” districts were created through splitting of previously existing districts. As a

result, virtually the only discrepancies from a fully longitudinal study of a single sample of small

rural districts are the few cases in which two small rural districts might merge into a single, new

district that is not small.
7

2. Small Public School Districts in America’s Rural Locales

In 1993-94, half of the regular public school districts in

America were rural, and the majority of these were small,

with a total enrollment of fewer than 100 students per high

school grade and 25 students per elementary grade (figure

2.1). One-fourth of the districts in the nation were small

and rural, and in the Midwest, South Central, and West,

more than one-third were (table A2.3a). However, only one

student in forty in the nation attended schools in small rural

districts. The majority of small rural districts, like other

districts, were unified (K-12) districts, but one-third were

separate elementary or secondary districts (table A2.1).

Between 1986-87 and 1993-94, the number of regular

public school districts in the nation declined by 700, and

most closures were small rural districts (figure 2.7).

Among small rural districts, 1 in 9 closed during this

period. However, due to the creation of some new districts

out of consolidations, the net loss was 415 districts, or 1 in

11 (figure 2.8). Closures of small rural districts were most

prevalent in the Midwest (figure 2.9); and most small rural

district closures were elementary (K-8) districts

(table A2.1). Contrasted with the declining numbers of

districts, total enrollment increased slightly in small rural

districts (figure 2.10). As a result, focusing only on districts

that were in existence all 8 years, the average surviving

small rural district had 9 percent more students in 1993-94

than it had in 1986-87.
8
The analyses include regular public school districts only. Thirty-three districts that did not specify their 4

grade ranges in any year are excluded from analyses.

 For a discussion of how size and location of schools districts are defined, see chapter 1. Briefly, rural 5

status is based on the modal Common Core of Data and U.S. Census classifications of locales of schools in district;

and smallness is based on a total enrollment of fewer than 25 students per elementary grade and 100 students per

secondary grade.

Counts of small rural and other districts by region are shown in table A2.3. This and other supporting 6

tables can be found in appendix A.

9

Background

While the majority of public elementary and secondary schools experienced declining

enrollments during the 1970s and early 1980s, rural schools, already serving small numbers of

pupils, experienced the greatest percentage reduction of enrollment (Salmon 1990). In many

districts, the decline in enrollment was sufficient to require closure or consolidation. In the last half

of the 1980s, rural schools and the districts in which they were located continued to decline in

numbers, as well as in enrollment. In this chapter, a picture of the status of small rural districts in

America in 1993-94 is presented, including geographic information and the age categories of

students served (elementary, serving children roughly from 4 to 13, secondary, serving children

roughly from 13 to 18, or combined). Following the status picture, a description of trends over the

7 years leading up to 1993-94 is presented.

Small Rural Districts in 1993-94

Nearly half (46 percent) of the 14,648 regular public school districts in America were located

in rural areas in 1993-94; and more than 60 percent of rural districts were small. Thus, there were 4

4,238 small rural districts in the country (table A2.1). As shown in figure 2.1, there were also 814 5

small districts in nonrural areas, but these constituted only 11 percent of all nonrural districts.

Clearly, it is primarily in rural areas that one finds small school districts in America. In towns and

cities, where people could make a choice to form large districts or split their schools into small

districts, they rarely opted for small districts.

Small rural districts are found in many states, but their concentration is much greater in some

regions than in others, as shown in Figure 2.2. Nearly half (47 percent) of the 4,238 small rural

districts were located in the Midwest in 1993-94, where 36 percent of all school districts were small 6

and rural. Similar percentages of school districts in the South Central (43 percent) and West (35

percent) were small rural districts, but a smaller percentage of districts were small and rural in the

Northeast (14 percent), where population density is greatest; and in the Southeast, where the majority

of rural districts were large, only 16 (1 percent of all districts in the region) were small and rural.

There were five states in which two-thirds or more of the districts were both small and rural: North

Dakota (87 percent), South Dakota (75 percent), Montana (75 percent), Nebraska (71 percent), and

Alaska (67 percent). Percentages for all states are presented in table A2.4b in appendix A.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of D

4,238

814

2,741

6,855

Rural districts Nonrural districts

0

1,000

2,000

3,000

4,000

5,000

6,000

7,000

8,000 Number of districts

Small Large

10

Figure 2.1. Total numbers of small and large public school districts in rural and nonrural areas in 

1993-94

Figure 2.2. Percentages of districts that were both small and in rural locations, by state, in 1993-94

0-10%

10-25%

25-50%

50-100%
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

818

4,888

Rural districts Nonrural districts

0

1,000

2,000

3,000

4,000

5,000

6,000 Average district enrollment

 Corresponding median enrollments were 434 and 2,039, respectively. 7

11

These numbers suggest that small rural school districts make up a major portion (28 percent)

of all school districts in America, but they enroll far fewer students than other districts. The

1,131,000 students enrolled in small rural districts in 1993-94 constitute only about 1 student in 40

in the United States (see table A2.2 in appendix A for complete data). As shown in figure 2.3, the

average size of rural districts, large and small, was only about 800 students, compared to an average

of nearly 5,000 in nonrural districts. Of course, small rural districts, by definition, had even fewer 7

students, averaging about 250 per district.

Figure 2.3. Average enrollment size of school districts in rural and nonrural locations in 1993-94

Consideration of the sizes of districts requires information about the grade levels served.

Using this report’s definition of “small,” a small elementary district serving grades K-8 might have

between 1 and 224 students, a small secondary district serving grades 9-12 might have between 1

and 399 students, and a small unified district serving all 13 grades might have as many as 624

students. The preponderance of districts in the country (73 percent in 1993-94) are unified, but

various comparisons between small rural and other districts are affected by the percentages of

districts in each category that are elementary, secondary, or unified.

District Grade Level Types. In 1993-94, 49 percent of elementary districts and 48 percent

of unified districts were rural, compared to 40 percent of secondary districts, as shown in figure 2.4.

This difference suggests that either (a) in many rural areas, students were attending elementary

schools in rural areas but were transported to high schools located in separate districts in towns or

cities or (b) in rural areas more than nonrural areas, multiple separate elementary districts were
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

49.3 47.6

39.5

Elementary districts Unified districts Secondary districts

0

20

40

60

80

100 Percentage

The difference between secondary and unified districts is due primarily to the definition of “small:” a 8

secondary district with 50 to 90 students in every grade would be considered small but a unified district would not.

12

"feeders" into other rural secondary (or unified) districts for secondary education. Aggregate

enrollments in elementary and secondary (i.e., nonunified) districts in rural and nonrural areas can

shed light on these possibilities. As shown in figure 2.5, there were 294,000 students in elementary

districts in rural areas and 70,000 students in secondary districts, compared to 2,268,000 in

elementary and 964,000 in secondary districts in nonrural areas. 

The preponderance of elementary districts that are K-8 and of secondary districts that are 9-

12 suggests that there are a total of 33,000 students in each grade in elementary rural districts and

only 17,000 students in each grade in secondary rural districts. In nonrural districts, there were about

252,000 students in each grade in elementary districts and 241,000 students per grade in secondary

districts. The apparent attrition in rural districts, from 33,000 in elementary grades to 17,000 in

secondary grades, exceeds that in nonrural districts by so much that it cannot be explained in terms

such as increasing birth cohorts. Apparently, a large proportion of students enrolled in elementary

rural districts did not go on to high school education in secondary rural districts. They either

transferred to rural unified districts or to nonrural districts. 

Figure 2.4. Percentages of elementary, secondary, and unified districts that were in rural locations 

in 1993-94

In rural areas, 78 percent of the elementary districts and 84 percent of the secondary districts

were small in 1993-94, but only 54 percent of unified districts were small, as shown in figure 2.6.

There were large percentages small districts among all three types in rural areas, although the

smallest districts were elementary. In contrast, in nonrural areas, it was only among elementary 8
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

294

2,268

5,346

34,254

70 964

Rural districts Nonrural districts

0

5,000

10,000

15,000

20,000

25,000

30,000

35,000

40,000 Number of students in thousands

Elementary Unified Secondary

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

78.4

30.7

53.9

4.4

83.5

12.8

Rural districts Nonrural districts

0

20

40

60

80

100 Percentage

Elementary Unified Secondary

13

Figure 2.5. Total numbers of students in elementary, secondary, and unified districts in rural and nonrural

areas in 1993-94

Figure 2.6. Percentages of elementary, secondary, and unified districts in rural and nonrural areas that

were small in 1993-94
14

districts that a substantial percentage of small districts could be found (31 percent). Only 13 percent

of secondary and 4 percent of unified nonrural districts were small. Although cities and towns might

break up their elementary schools into separate, small districts, local education agencies serving

secondary grades rarely did so: the value of a larger size is more important in later grades, where

students with different interests and aptitudes expect more curricular choices. 

Trends in Small Rural Districts from 1986-87 to 1993-94

The snapshot of small rural districts in 1993-94 is one slice from a longitudinal trend, and

findings of reliable trends over the preceding 8 years may provide the basis for guesses as to what

the snapshot will show in the remainder of the 20th century. The Common Core of Data contains

information about virtually all public school districts in the country, and information about changes

in individual districts can be followed over the years.

This section, like similar sections in later chapters, examines trends in small rural

districts—do they close, do they gain or lose students, how do they change? To support this purpose,

each school district is classified as small and rural once for the entire period, even though its

enrollment may grow past a threshold or a town may sprout up around it during the period. The

classification is based on the earliest year of the period in which the district was in operation—except

that the size determination (small or not small) was based on 1987-88 enrollment, rather than 1986-

87 enrollment, due to the substantially greater amount of missing data requiring imputation in 1986-

87, the first year of the most recent Common Core of Data series. Also, 1990 Census data played

a major role in the determination of whether a district was located in a rural locale.

The most critical event that can happen to a school district is closure, with students

assimilated into a nearby district or schools consolidated with a nearby district to form a “new”

district. As shown in figure 2.7, about as many closures of small rural districts occurred between

1986-87 and 1993-94 as in all other categories of districts combined. Generally, districts that closed

were small districts, whether they were rural or nonrural: only 2 to 3 percent of large districts closed.

Finally, closures of small rural districts were not uniform over this period: almost half (237 out of

488) occurred, in fact, between 1991-92 and 1993-94.

Some district consolidations resulted in the creation of a “new” district, and in a handful of

cases, a district split into two districts, also creating “new” districts. Therefore, net losses of small

rural and other districts were less than the total numbers of closures. As shown in figure 2.8, net

losses amounted to 9 percent in small rural districts. By contrast, there was less than 1 percent net

loss of large school districts over this period. Finally, it should be noted that over half of the net loss

in small rural districts (219 of 415) occurred between 1991-92 and 1993-94. 
1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

100

200

300

400

500 District closures

Small rural districts

Small nonrural districts

Large nonrural districts

Large rural districts

488

246

135

69

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

100

-100

-200

-300

-400

-500

Net district losses

Small rural districts

Small nonrural districts

Large nonrural districts

Large rural districts

-415

-212

-55

-15

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

15

Figure 2.7. Cumulative numbers of small and large school district closures between 1986-87 and 1993-94

in rural and nonrural areas

Figure 2.8. Cumulative net losses in numbers of small and large school districts between 1986-87 and 1993-

94 in rural and nonrural areas
1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

50

-50

-100

-150

-200

-250

-300

Net district losses

Midwest

South Central

West

Northeast

-272

-64 (South Central)

-65 (West)

-11

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

16

The greatest losses in small rural districts, both in raw numbers and percentages, were in the

Midwest, where there was a net loss of 272 small rural districts (12 percent) between 1986-87 and

1993-94, as shown in figure 2.9. (In the Southeast, not shown in the figure, 3 of the 19 small rural

districts closed.) In some states, the net loss of school districts was confined almost entirely to small

rural districts, while in others, there were substantial net losses in other types of districts as well. In

Iowa, South Dakota, North Dakota, and Minnesota, combined, there were 123 fewer small rural

districts in 1993-94 than there had been in 1986-87, but these states lost only 3 other districts on

balance. On the other hand, in Montana, Nebraska, Oklahoma, and Illinois, the net combined loss

of 233 small rural districts was nearly matched by a net loss of 167 other districts. Clearly, patterns

of closures and losses of districts varied between states, suggesting different factors at work. 

Figure 2.9. Cumulative net losses in numbers of small rural school districts between 1986-87 and 1993-94,

by region

 One might expect losses of school districts to be proportional to losses in school-aged

populations, but in the period from 1986-87 to 1993-94, the total enrollment in American public

schools rose from 39,600,000 to 43,200,000, a gain of 9 percent. Granted, these gains were not

spread uniformly across rural and nonrural districts, but, as shown in figure 2.10, there were even

small gains (cumulatively, 8,000 students) in small rural districts. Overall, these gains took place

primarily in the last half of the period under study, and among small rural districts, a loss of 16,000

students between 1986-87 and 1990-91 was followed by a gain of 24,000 students in the next 3

years. 

Taken together, declines in numbers of districts coupled with increases in numbers of

students mean that the average enrollment size of school districts increased over this period. In both

small rural districts and other districts, there was a 9 percent average increase in the enrollment of
1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

500

1,000

1,500

2,000

2,500

3,000

3,500

-500

Net enrollment gains in thousands

Small rural districts

Small nonrural districts

Large nonrural districts

Large rural districts

3,273

302

+25 (small, nonrural)

+8 (small, rural)

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

When the comparison is based on the same set of districts in 1986-87 and 1993-94, the average increase in 9

a small rural district is from 9 to 10 students per grade, compared to an increase from 171 to 212 students per grade

in large, nonrural districts.

17

school districts (if they did not close). To the extent that rural schools might feel pressures due to

their minimal numbers of students, this is good news. The average size of rural school districts rose

from 730 to 820, while the average size of nonrural school districts rose from 4,300 to 4,900. These

changes gave district administrators both the opportunity and need to take actions to deal with

increased enrollments, which are discussed in later chapters. 

Figure 2.10. Cumulative net gains in numbers of students enrolled in small and large school districts in rural

and nonrural locations, between 1986-87 and 1993-94

Net Loss by District Grade Level Types. Net losses of small rural districts were greatest

among elementary districts: as shown in figure 2.11, there were 16 percent fewer small rural

elementary districts in 1993-94 than there were in 1986-87, and this loss accelerated over the period

of observation. Extrapolating to the future in a straight line, one would expect the number of small

rural elementary districts to be only half their 1993-94 numbers by 2013-14. 

At the same time that small rural elementary districts were declining in numbers, the total

number of students in these districts remained roughly constant. Therefore, the average enrollments

in these districts increased, as shown in figure 2.12. An average surviving small rural elementary

district had 7.8 students per grade in 1986-87, and this average increased to 9.2 in 1993-94. To put

this in context, the average surviving large nonrural elementary district had 168 students per grade

in 1986-87, and this average increased to 208 in 1993-94. Although these represent roughly the 9
1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

-50

-100

-150

-200

-250

Net district losses

Elementary

Unified

Secondary

-239

-166

-10

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

500

1,000

1,500

2,000 Average district enrollment size

Small rural elementary districts

Small nonrural elementary districts

Large nonrural elementary districts

Large rural elementary districts

1,868

527

160

83

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

18

Figure 2.11. Cumulative net losses in numbers of elementary, secondary, and unified small rural school

districts, between 1986-87 and 1993-94

Figure 2.12. Increases in average enrollment sizes of small and large elementary school districts in rural and

nonrural locations, between 1986-87 and 1993-94
 If the definition of small rural education were expanded to include large rural districts with a majority of 10

small schools, an additional 254 districts would have been included. In particular, in the states in the South other

than Texas, Oklahoma, and Arkansas, the total number of small rural districts would be increased from 16 to 54. 

The added districts had, by definition, larger total enrollments, so that under the expanded definition, small rural

districts enroll 1/30 of the nation’s students.

 With the expanded definition of small rural education, including 254 additional districts, the net loss of 11

small rural districts remained at 415 but the total growth in enrollment in small rural districts was about 23,000,

rather than 8,000, which meant that the average surviving small rural district experienced an 11 percent increase in

enrollment.

19

same percentage increases, they have quite different policy implications for district

administrators—in the case of small rural districts, the increase may help to ensure economic

viability; in the case of large nonrural districts, it is likely to lead to pressures for capital outlay to

build a new elementary school. 

Summary

A snapshot of American school districts in 1993-94 reveals the following patterns.

Half of the regular public school districts in America are rural, and

the majority of these are small. The largest concentrations of small

rural districts are in the Midwest, South Central, and West, where

more than one-third of the districts fall into this category. There were

few small rural districts in the Southeast. In the 13 states in the

Southeast, there were only 16 small rural districts. Although 1 in 4

districts in the country is small and rural, these districts enroll only on

in every 40 students. The majority of small rural districts, like other

districts, are unified (K-12) districts.10

Extending the picture to the longitudinal trends over the preceding 7 years reveals additional

patterns.

Most school district closures in the country were small rural districts.

Among small rural districts, 1 in 9 closed during this period.

However, due to openings, the net loss was 1 in 11. The highest rates

and numbers of closures of small rural districts were in the Midwest;

and most closures of small rural districts were among elementary (K8) districts. Contrasted with the declining numbers of districts, total

enrollment increased slightly in small rural districts. As a result, the

average surviving small rural district was 9 percent larger in 1993-94

than it was in 1986-87.11

The distributions of schools in districts and the ways in which districts dealt with changing

conditions are discussed in the next chapter.
20
21

3. Characteristics of Schools in Small Rural School Districts 

In 1993-94, about 8,000 of the nation’s 84,000 public

schools were located in small rural districts (figure 3.1).

Most small rural elementary districts operated a single

school, while small rural secondary and unified districts

usually had 2 or 3 schools (figure 3.3). High schools in

four-fifths of all rural districts had fewer than 100 students

per grade (table 3.1). Some of the schools in small rural

districts were very small: a fifth of the schools in small

rural districts had fewer than one teacher per grade (figure

3.4), including 64 percent of the elementary schools (figure

3.5). There were relatively few intermediate schools and

many combined (K-12) schools in these districts (figure

3.7). About a quarter of the schools serving primary grades

offered prekindergarten, similar to findings in other types

of districts (figure 3.8). Finally, relatively few small rural

districts either offered ungraded instruction or operated

alternative, vocational, or special education schools (figure

3.9). 

Between 1986-87 and 1993-94, about 415 schools closed

their doors as the small rural districts in which they

operated closed, and 315 more were assimilated into

consolidated districts. Even in small rural districts that

continued to operate, there was a net closure of 92 schools.

There was a tendency for small rural districts to add

intermediate schools, but there was a net loss of separate

elementary and high schools in these districts (figure 3.13).

The number of schools in small rural districts enrolling

prekindergarten students more than doubled during this

period (figure 3.14), while the number offering ungraded

instruction declined (figure 3.15).
22
Table A3.8 lists all combinations of elementary, intermediate, high, combined, and ungraded schools that 12

were reported in three or more districts in at least 1 of the 8 years examined. Combinations that were reported less

frequently are listed as “other.” This table includes a few districts (13 in 1993-94) with no schools reporting either

enrollment by grades or ungraded students.

23

Background

This chapter describes characteristics of schools in small rural districts during the years from

1986-87 to 1993-94. Characteristics such as school size, educational focus (e.g., vocational

education and alternative education), and grade structures are influenced by different historical,

social, political, and economic factors. Many district and school reform efforts made in response

to problems such as declining enrollments, low academic performance, and funding limitations alter

school and grade structures. Although some rural districts and schools have turned to alternatives

such as regional cooperatives and the use of telecommunication for delivering curricula in order to

provide quality educational services for their children, Sher (1995) has pointed out that, in recent

years, whereas in 

certain parts of metropolitan America such innovations as “schools-within-schools,”

decentralization, school/community partnerships, and more personalized teaching and

learning strategies are being enthusiastically embraced, ... much of rural America

(where ironically, many of these metropolitan “innovations” were first developed)

is still being coerced into accepting school consolidations and school district mergers

as the cornerstone of rural school reform (Barker 1991; DeYoung and Howley 1990;

Monk 1991; Phelps and Prock 1991). 

Others concur with Sher, and as Haller and Monk (1988) suggest, there are “inconsistencies between

modern and traditional views of school size and . . . the traditional view is likely to dominate modern

reform efforts in rural areas.” The traditional view, according to Haller and Monk, favors

consolidation.

Schools in Small Rural Districts in 1993-94

In 1993-94, 23 percent of the nation’s public schools were located in rural districts, and

40 percent of those were in small districts. As shown in figure 3.1, 7,917 of the nation’s 84,320

schools were located in small rural districts. Since there were 4,238 small rural districts in all, on

average, a small rural district would have 1.9 schools. In fact, as shown in table A3.8 (in appendix

A), more than one-third (1,520) of these districts had one elementary school and one high school, 12

and the next two most frequent types of small rural districts consisted of either a single elementary

school (1,185 districts) or a series of one elementary, one intermediate, and one high school (462

districts). 

The average number of schools in other districts was 7.3. Part of the reason for the smaller

average number of schools in small rural districts is that more of these districts are separate

elementary or secondary districts, rather than unified districts. Unified districts are much more likely
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

7,917

1,157

11,692

63,554

Rural districts Nonrural districts

0

10,000

20,000

30,000

40,000

50,000

60,000

70,000 Number of schools

Small districts Large districts

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

20.7

8.2

8.2

62.9

8.1

0.7

14.5

76.6

20.8

5

5.1

69.2

Small rural

districts

Small nonrural

districts

Large rural

districts

Large nonrural

districts

0 20 40 60 80 100

Percentage of schools

Elementary districts

Unified districts

Secondary districts

24

to have multiple schools. As shown in figure 3.2, about 20 percent of the schools in both elementary

and secondary districts were in small rural districts, while only 8 percent of the schools in unified

districts were in small rural districts. 

Figure 3.1. Total numbers of schools in small and large districts in rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94

Figure 3.2. Percentages of schools in elementary, secondary, and unified districts that are in small and large

districts in rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

1.1

1.1

1.6

3.7

2.3

2.1

4.7

10.9

1.4

1.4

1.7

2.9

Small rural

districts

Small nonrural

districts

Large rural

districts

Large nonrural

districts

0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14

Average number of schools

Elementary districts

Unified districts

Secondary districts

Specifically, a “very small” school is defined as a small school (previously defined) whose number of 13

full-time equivalent teachers is less than the number of grades in the grade span. 

25

Based on this variation in levels, it is useful to examine the average number of schools per

district by grade level type. As shown in figure 3.3, small rural elementary or secondary districts

usually have only a single school, whereas small rural unified districts tend to have two. By contrast,

large nonrural unified districts average over 10 schools. Thus, small rural districts tend to have

fewest schools because they are more likely to be separate elementary or secondary districts, which

have smaller numbers of schools, or because even when they are unified, they tend to have fewer

schools than other unified districts. 

Figure 3.3. Average number of schools in elementary, secondary, and unified districts that are in small and

large districts in rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94

Small, Very Small, and Small Rural Schools. The criteria of “small” and “rural” have been

applied in the preceding sections to school districts, but it is also of interest to know whether small

and rural schools are almost always located in small and rural districts. Small schools can be defined

exactly as small districts are, by whether the number of students in each of the elementary (or

secondary) grades in the school averages less than 25 (or 100). One might consider a further

category of “very small” schools—schools with so few students that they employ fewer than one

teacher per grade. 13
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

Small rural

districts

Small nonrural

districts

Large rural

districts

Large nonrural

districts

0

20

40

60

80 Percentage

 (72.9)

(76.2)

(21.2) (32.8)

(24.6)

(5)

(8.2)

(2.4)

Small Schools

Very small schools

26

While most schools in small districts were small in 1993-94, as shown in figure 3.4, there

were small schools, and even some very small schools, in large nonrural districts. These are

typically special-purpose schools, such as special education schools or continuation schools for

students who would otherwise drop out. Small and very small schools in small or rural districts, on

the other hand, are generally the result of population sparseness, because they are typically the only

school in the district serving a particular grade level. Very small schools, fitting the size stereotype

of country schools of the late 19th century, still constitute 20 percent of the schools in small rural

districts. (Although they are even more common in small nonrural districts, there are relatively few

such districts. Very small schools are likely to be found in small rural settings.) 

Figure 3.4. Percentages of schools that were small or very small, in small and large districts in rural and

nonrural areas in 1993-94

Because schools have been categorized as “small” using the same students-per-grade

threshold used in categorizing districts as “small,” it may seem paradoxical that the percentages of

schools in small districts that are small are not close to 100 percent. The explanation for this

paradox is that many small unified districts have a single “small” high school (with fewer than 100

students per grade) and a single “large” elementary school (with more than 25 students per grade):

K-12 districts with a single elementary school and a single high school and about 30 to 45 students

per grade would be counted as small districts, but their elementary schools would not be counted as

small. As seen in figure 3.5, only about 70 percent of schools in unified small rural districts were

small, but about 90 percent of schools in separate elementary and secondary small rural districts were

small.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

Elementary

districts

Unified

districts

Secondary

districts

0

20

40

60

80

100 Percentage

Small (94.4)

Very small

(64.1)

Small (71.3)

Very small

(11.8)

Small (89.2)

Very small

(12.5)

Small Schools

Very small schools

 To avoid counting small special, nonregular, alternative high schools that sometimes accompanied 14

regular high schools in the same district, the largest high school in the district was the focus of this comparison. 

27

Large schools in separate elementary and secondary small rural districts arise from two

sources: (1) districts that split grade levels between schools and happen to have slightly more than

the defining number of students per grade in the grades in one school but overall fewer than 

this number per grade in the entire range of grades offered in the district; and (2) the district

classification of “small” was held constant across years, as discussed in chapter 1, to facilitate

longitudinal comparisons, but the school classification of “small” was redetermined for each year—a

few districts that were small in 1987-88 grew in enrollment until by 1993-94, one or more of their

schools were no longer classifiable as small. A comparison of tables A3.1 and A3.2 shows that the

total number of large schools in separate elementary or secondary small rural districts grew from 31

in 1987-88 to 112 in 1993-94. 

The fact that very small schools in small rural districts are mostly elementary ones, as shown

in figure 3.5, reflects the greater need for a critical mass of teachers at the secondary level, to address

the needs for curricular choice.

Figure 3.5. Percentages of schools that were small or very small, in elementary, secondary, and unified

small rural districts in 1993-94

In most rural districts, high school students attended small high schools, as shown in table

3.1. In 1993-94, in 81 percent of rural districts with high schools (i.e., with schools serving grade

11 or 12) the largest (or only) high school had fewer than 100 students per grade, and in 55 percent 14

of rural districts, fewer than 50 students per grade. In only 21 percent of nonrural districts, by
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

Small rural

districts

Small nonrural

districts

Large rural

districts

Large nonrural

districts

0

20

40

60

80 Percentage

Small (76.2)

Small (72.9)

Small (24.6)

Small (8.2)

Small, 

rural 

(75.1)

Small, 

rural

(1.6)

Small, rural

(23.0)

Small, rural 

(1.3)

Small rural schools

Small schools

28

contrast, did all high schools have fewer than 100 students per grade, only 5 percent had fewer than

50 students per grade.

Table 3.1. Percentages of rural and nonrural districts, by enrollment per grade in largest high school, in

1993-94

Enrollment per Grade Rural Districts Nonrural Districts

Fewer than 50 54.9 4.8

50-99 26.1 16.5

100-199 14.2 31.9

200 or More 4.8 46.8

Total 100.0 100.0

Source: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data.

Note: Enrollments are for grades 9-12, in the largest school in a district that enrolled 11th or 12th grades.

 The paradoxical comparisons concerning sizes of schools within districts do not appear to

be matched by similar conflicts in the definition of rural locale, although it would be definitionally

possible for many of the schools in rural districts to be, themselves, nonrural. As seen in figure 3.6,

when the percentage of small rural schools is subtracted from the total percentage of small schools,

only about 1 to 2 percent of the schools in rural districts were small but not rural. These arise

because some multischool districts have a combination of rural and small town schools. They are

called “rural districts” if more of their schools are rural than any of the other six locale categories,

ranging from small town to large central city.

Figure 3.6. Percentages of schools that were small and rural, in small and large districts in rural and

n areas in

1
Note: Schools which did not specify their grade levels are not included in this figure.

51.5

64.5

55

63.4

9.6

5

15.4

16.3

31.8

19.8

23.9

16.2

6.4

6.8

4.2

2.2

0.1

2.9

0.2

0.8

Small rural

districts

Small nonrural

districts

Large rural

districts

Large nonrural

districts

0 20 40 60 80 100

Percentage of schools

Elementary schools

Intermediate schools

High schools

Combined schools

Ungraded schools

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

29

School Grade Levels Served. Most schools in the nation are elementary schools, and that

is also true in small rural districts. However, as shown in figure 3.7, there are differences in the

distributions of schools serving different grade level types between small rural and other districts.

Schools in small districts were less likely to be intermediate schools and more likely to be combined

(e.g., K-12) schools; and in rural districts the ratio of elementary schools to high schools was roughly

2 to 1, compared to 4 to 1 in nonrural districts (table A3.5). Both of the variations between small

and large districts suggest pressures to minimize the number of separate schools in operation. The

variations between rural and nonrural districts suggest that rural districts (1) are often not in a

position to operate multiple elementary feeder schools into a larger high school and (2) often do not

have sufficient numbers of special students to warrant a separate, ungraded school. 

In fact, examination of table A3.8 in appendix A suggests that in 1993-94, fewer than 300

of the 4,238 small rural districts in the country operated more than one elementary school, fewer than

70, more than two. As noted in chapter 2, there are relatively more separate elementary and

secondary districts in rural areas; that is, elementary grade students in small rural districts were more

likely to enroll in a different district when they went to high school.

Figure 3.7. Percentages of schools that offered various grade levels, in small and large districts in rural and

nonrural areas in 1993-94
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

Small rural

districts

Small nonrural

districts

Large rural

districts

Large nonrural

districts

0

20

40

60

80

100 Percentage

Kindergarten 

(90.8) Kindergarten 

(88.8) Kindergarten 

(86.7)

Kindergarten 

(87)

Prekindergarten 

(25.6)

Prekindergarten 

(15.7)

Prekindergarten 

(27.8) Prekindergarten 

(28.9)

30

There is substantial state-by-state variation as to whether public school districts are expected

to offer prekindergarten instruction. However, as seen in figure 3.8, small rural districts are not very

different from other districts on this issue: about 9 out of 10 elementary and combined schools

offered kindergarten, and about a quarter of the schools that offered kindergarten also offered

prekindergarten. In small and large rural and nonrural districts, this represents a dramatic increase

from 1986-87 to 1993-94, as shown in table A3.6. 

Figure 3.8. Percentages of elementary and combined schools that offered kindergarten, and the percentage

of these that offered prekindergarten, in small and large districts in rural and nonrural areas

in 1993-94

Some regular schools have offered ungraded instruction for some of their students, designed

to avoid constraints imposed by a grade-oriented curriculum and a rigid annual grade promotion

policy. Other schools have focused purely on groups of students with special needs, and these are

recorded in the Common Core of Data as alternative, vocational, or special education schools. For

this report, these latter three types of schools are combined into a category of “nonregular” schools.

As shown in figure 3.9, very few of the schools in small rural districts were nonregular schools (1.4

percent), and few of the schools in these districts had any ungraded students (8.6 percent). However,

as can be seen by comparing these numbers, many more schools offered some ungraded instruction

than the number categorized as nonregular schools. Providing ungraded instruction appears to be

more closely related to a district’s size than to whether it is rural or not, reflecting the fact that few

districts categorized as small in this report would have enough students with needs warranting the

establishment of an ungraded curriculum. However, the availability of a nonregular school appears

to be more closely relate to district location than to size: very few nonregular schools were in rural

districts, large or small.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

1.4

9.8

3 6.3 8.6

14.3

22.1

30.3

Small rural

districts

Small nonrural

districts

Large rural

districts

Large nonrural

districts

0

20

40

60

80

100 Percentage

Nonregular schools Schools with ungraded students

31

Figure 3.9. Percentages of nonregular schools and schools offering ungraded instruction, in small and large

districts in rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94

Trends in Schools in Small Rural Districts from 1986-87 to 1993-94

The major change that a local education agency can make in response to changing

populations and changing funding is to open new schools or close old ones. They can also change

the span of grades offered in each school. Over the period from 1986-87 to 1993-94, as shown in

figure 3.10, a substantial number of schools in small districts were closed, while a substantial

number of schools were opened in large nonrural districts. The net loss of 507 schools in small rural

districts represents only a global summary of the processes occurring. A closer examination of the

data reveals that most school closures in small rural districts were in effect district closures, as no

schools remained open in the district. 

In some cases, as a district consolidated with another district, a school might remain open;

however, in CCD such a school would be identified as a new school in the other district. In fact, as

an automatic result of the 488 small rural district closures, 730 nominal school closures were

recorded, but because there were 315 “new” schools in adjacent districts that added enrollment when

a district closed, the actual loss of schools through small rural district closure appears to be 415,

which is, coincidentally, exactly the same as the net loss of small rural districts (see table 2.8). In

addition, in continuing small rural districts not involved in a consolidation, there was a net loss of

92 schools during this period. A tabulation of the frequencies of specific year-to-year transitions

(e.g., from one elementary and one high school to one elementary, one intermediate, and one high

school) is shown in table A3.9 in appendix A. 
1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

500

1,000

1,500

2,000

2,500

3,000

-500

-1,000

Net school gains and losses

Small rural districts

Small nonrural districts

Large nonrural districts

Large rural districts

-507

-255

72

2,613

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

500

1,000

1,500

2,000

2,500

-500

Net school gains and losses

Small rural elementary districts

Small rural unified districts

Small rural secondary districts

All other elementary districts

All other unified districts

All other secondary districts

-407

-161

51 (other secondary)

2,402

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

61 (small, rural secondary)

-23

32

Figure 3.10. Cumulative net gains and losses of schools in small and large districts in rural and nonrural

areas between 1986-87 and 1993-94

Closures and openings were not spread uniformly across elementary, secondary, and unified

districts or across elementary, intermediate, high, or combined schools. As shown in figure 3.11,

Figure 3.11. Cumulative net gains and losses of schools in elementary, secondary, and unified small rural and

other districts between 1986-87 and 1993-94
1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

100

200

300

-100

-200

-300

Net gains and losses

Small rural elementary districts

Small rural unified districts

Small rural secondary districts

All other elementary districts

All other unified districts

All other secondary districts

-245

-166

22 (other secondary)

279

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

29 (small, rural secondary)

-123

33

61 schools were added in small rural secondary districts, even though across all small rural districts

the numbers of schools declined by 507, and the gains in schools in large or nonrural districts

occurred primarily in unified districts. An examination of the details in table A3.9 in appendix A

reveals that the major sources of the addition of 61 schools in small rural secondary districts were

between 1991-92 and 1993-94 and were in school districts that added an elementary and an

intermediate school to their single high school (54 new schools in 27 districts). 

Addition of an elementary and intermediate school to a high school (secondary) district

through consolidation with adjacent district(s) would change the grade span of the district, leading

it to be counted later as a unified district. However, in order to present the information on trends,

the district is counted in its original category in figure 3.11. (Other changes that would change grade

level categories of some small rural districts that occurred include: 86 districts that dropped high

school while keeping their elementary and possibly intermediate school, 10 districts that added high

school, 41 districts that changed their elementary school to a combined school or vice versa, and 23

districts that dropped either their elementary school or the elementary grades from their combined

school.) 

Small, Very Small, and Small Rural Schools. Patterns of net gains and losses of small,

very small, and small rural schools over the period from 1986-87 to 1993-94 are similar to the

patterns for all schools in these districts. Most small school closures occurred in elementary districts,

and the numbers of small schools increased in secondary districts. As noted above, these increases

frequently involved addition of an elementary school through consolidation with an adjacent district.

Figure 3.12. Cumulative net gains or losses of very small schools, in elementary, secondary, and unified small

rural and other districts from 1986-87 to 1993-94
Note: Schools which did not specify their grade levels are not included in this figure.

-11.8

-20.8

-2.7

4.8

59

28.9

13.4

5.2

-12.6

-22.9

0.5

5.4

42.8

46.3

10

50.7

0

34.6

-50

-37

Small rural

districts

Small nonrural

districts

Large rural

districts

Large nonrural

districts

-60 -40 -20 0 20 40 60 80

Percentage of schools

Elementary schools

Intermediate schools

High schools

Combined schools

Ungraded schools

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

34

At the beginning of the period under examination, there were twice as many very small

schools in small rural districts as in large nonrural districts. However, because the net loss of 339

very small schools in small rural districts, shown in figure 3.12, was “matched” by a net increase of

428 very small schools in large nonrural districts, by 1993-94 there were roughly the same number

of very small schools (small schools with fewer than one teacher per grade) in both types of districts.

School Grade Levels Served. Substantial trends in changing grade spans of schools

characterized small rural districts between 1986-87 and 1993-94, as shown in figure 3.13. In

particular, there was a 59 percent increase in total intermediate schools, from 480 to 763, in these

districts, and a 43 percent increase in total combined (e.g., K-12) schools, from 355 to 507. Many

separate elementary and secondary districts were not only merging into unified districts, but they

were also merging their separate elementary and secondary schools into combined (K-12) schools.

At the same time, there were also substantial increases in combined schools in large and nonrural

districts, suggesting that the attraction of combining all grades in a single school is not limited to

small rural districts. 

Figure 3.13. Net percentage gains and losses of schools that offered various grade levels, in small and large

districts in rural and nonrural areas between 1986-87 and 1993-94

One might expect that particular changes in the configurations of schools in a district would

be closely related to whether enrollment increased or decreased. However, some of the same

transitions occurred in small rural districts with both decreasing and increasing enrollment. In

particular, frequent changes in small rural districts with one elementary school and one high school
1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

50

100

150

200

250 Net percentage gains

Small rural districts

Small nonrural districts

Large nonrural districts

Large rural districts

130.6%

136.9%

155.6%

231%

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

35

involved the opening or closing of an intermediate school. Among those with decreasing enrollment

in a year, 83 added an intermediate school while 45 dropped their intermediate school; and among

those with increasing enrollment, 98 added an intermediate school while 44 dropped their

intermediate school. This can be attributed to the attractiveness of intermediate schools, but it may

also suggest a lag of a year or two in district responses to changing enrollments. Further study of

these changes is needed. A separate tabulation of changes in schools in districts with increasing and

declining enrollment is presented in table A3.10 in appendix A. 

A dramatic trend occurred during this time period in the enrollment of prekindergarten

students, and it was felt as much in small rural districts as in other districts. As shown in figure 3.14,

the number of districts enrolling prekindergarten students increased steadily and more than doubled

in an 7-year period. 

Figure 3.14. Cumulative percentage gains of schools enrolling prekindergarten students in small and large

districts in rural and nonrural areas between 1986-87 and 1993-94

Finally, as noted above, by 1993-94, schools in small rural districts were less likely than

schools in other districts to offer ungraded instruction for some students, and schools in these

districts were less likely to be nonregular schools. However, the trends for these two attributes were

in opposite directions. As shown in figure 3.15, there was a decline in percentage of schools in small

rural districts that offered ungraded instruction, and it was a more rapid decline than in other types

of districts. 

In 1993-94, small rural districts were also less likely to operate separate alternative,

vocational, or special education schools. However, in this case there was a substantial trend toward

more nonregular schools in small rural districts, as well as in other districts, as shown in figure 3.16.
1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

10

-10

-20

-30

-40

Net percentage losses

Small rural districts

Small nonrural districts

Large nonrural districts

Large rural districts

-37%

-18.1%

-15.3%

-8.2%

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

20

40

60

80

100

120

-20

-40

-60

Net percentage gains

Small rural districts

Small nonrural districts

Large nonrural districts

Large rural districts

10.7%

42.9% (small, rural)

45.5% (large, rural)

51.7%

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

36

This increase was most pronounced during the period from 1989-90 to 1993-94, in which the number

of nonregular schools in small districts doubled, after declining during the preceding 3 years. 

Figure 3.15. Trends in percentages of schools offering ungraded instruction, in small and large districts in

rural and nonrural areas in 1993-94

Figure 3.16. Trends in percentages of nonregular schools, in small and large districts in rural and nonrural

areas in 1993-94
If the definition of small rural education were expanded to include “large rural districts with a majority of 15

small schools,” the picture would be similar. In the additional 254 small rural districts, there were an additional

1,401 schools, or about 5 to 6 schools per district. As in the other small rural districts, many of the schools were

very small.

Although none of the additional 254 large rural districts with a majority of small schools in the expanded 16

definition of small rural districts closed during this period, a net total of 76 schools in these districts were closed. 

37

Summary

Focusing the snapshot of small rural school districts in 1993-94 on the schools in those

districts reveals the following patterns.

About 8,000 of the nation’s 84,000 public schools were in small rural

districts. Most small rural elementary districts consisted of a single 15

school. Secondary and unified districts were somewhat more likely

to have two or three schools. A fifth of the schools in small rural

districts had fewer than one teacher per grade, and this included

64 percent of the elementary schools. In four-fifths of all rural

districts, high schools had fewer than 100 students per grade. There

were relatively few intermediate schools and many combined schools

in these districts, and few small rural districts had multiple feeder

elementary schools for a high school. 

About a quarter of the schools with kindergarten also offered

prekindergarten, similar to findings in other types of districts.

Finally, relatively few of the schools in these districts offered

ungraded instruction or were alternative, vocational, or special

education schools.

Extending this picture to longitudinal trends over the preceding 7 years reveals additional

patterns.

During this period, about 415 schools closed as the small rural

districts in which they operated closed, and 315 more were

assimilated into consolidated districts. In addition, there was a net

closure of 92 schools in small rural districts that continued to

operate. There was a tendency to add intermediate schools and 16

combined schools, while there was a loss of separate elementary and

high schools in these districts. The number of schools enrolling

prekindergarten students more than doubled during this period, while

the number of schools, both regular and nonregular, offering

ungraded instruction declined.
38
39

4. Characteristics of Students in Small Rural School Districts 

In 1993-94, about 1,100,000 of the nation’s 43,200,000

public school students were enrolled in small rural districts.

More of the students in small rural districts were either

white or Native American than elsewhere, while fewer were

Asian or African American (table 4.1). Few school-aged

children in small or rural districts (1.3 percent) were

reported as having limited English proficiency (table 4.6);

however, slightly more of the students in small rural

districts than elsewhere had Individualized Education

Programs (IEPs) to address special educational needs

(11.5 percent) (figure 4.7). In the South and West, but not

in other regions, relatively more of the children in small

rural districts were living in poverty (figure 4.8). 

During the latter part of the period from 1986-87 to 1993-

94, enrollments increased in small rural districts, although

not as fast as elsewhere. Although percentages of minority

enrollment increased by 10 percent overall (from 31 percent

to 34 percent of all public school students), they remained

virtually constant in small rural districts, at about

12 percent (table A4.1b). While the percentage of Native

Americans in small rural districts grew, the percentages of

Asians and African Americans in these districts declined

(figure 4.11). Finally, from 1987-88 to 1993-94, there was

a gradual increase in the proportion of students with

Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) in small rural

districts, as well as in other types of districts (figure 4.12).
40
 In this report, the racial/ethnic term "white" is used to refer to white, non-Hispanic students; and the term 17

"African American" is used to refer to black, non-Hispanic students. The five categories for CCD reporting are

Black non-Hispanic, White non-Hispanic, Hispanic, American Indian/Alaskan Native, and Asian or Pacific Islander. 

41

Background

Small rural school districts serve 2 to 3 percent of America’s public school students. Are the

students in these districts different from other students? Previous research (Stern 1994; Phelps and

Prock 1991; Herzog and Pittman 1995) has found that students in rural areas are financially not as

well off as their urban counterparts; they are geographically, economically, and culturally isolated;

their parents have lower educational levels and lower educational expectations for their children;

they are at greater risk of dropping out and have lower aspirations for higher education. On the other

hand, they have more positive attitudes toward their schools and communities, and a higher

percentage participate in extracurricular activities.

The CCD provides basic information on student characteristics. Information on racial

composition of the student body and the number of students with Individualized Education Programs

(IEPs) to address special needs is available for each year from 1987-88 to 1993-94. The decennial

Census also provides information on school-aged children living in the area served by each school

district, including the percentages of children with limited English proficiency (LEP) and living in

poverty in 1990. While the Census information gathered in 1990 cannot be considered current for

1993-94, demographic changes are sufficiently gradual that they can be used to compare students

enrolled in small rural districts with other students. 

Students in Small Rural Districts in 1993-94

Minority Students. Recent projections suggest that by the year 2035, whites will no longer 17

comprise the majority of the nation’s school-age population (Population Research Bureau 1993).

Well before this time, Hispanics are expected to become the nation’s largest minority group. These

projections imply an increasing number of LEP students and an increasing demand for instructional

programs for speakers of other languages. How are these changes affecting small rural districts?

In the 1993-94 school year, 135,000 African American, Hispanic, Asian, and Native

American students were enrolled in small rural districts: about 1 percent of all minority students in

the country. As shown in figure 4.1, they constituted about 12 percent of the students in small rural

districts, a smaller percentage than in large districts and in nonrural districts. In large nonrural

districts, where 85 percent of the nation’s students attend school, the percentage of minority students

was 37 percent.

The lower percentages of minority students in small rural districts do not necessarily mean

that all small rural districts enroll few minority students. In fact, as shown in figure 4.2, in 1993-94

there were 286 small rural school districts in which a majority of students were members of racial

or ethnic minorities (i.e., African American, Hispanic, Asian, or Native American students). In small
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

11.9

21.5

17.1

36.7

Rural districts Nonrural districts

0

20

40

60

80

100 Percentage

Small Large

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

286 78 264

917

3,952

736

2,477

5,938

Small rural

districts

Small nonrural

districts

Large rural

districts

Large nonrural

districts

0

1,000

2,000

3,000

4,000

5,000

6,000

7,000 Number of districts

Maj. of minority stud Maj. of nonminority stud

42

rural districts, as well as in other districts, large percentages of minority students were to be found

in a relatively small percentage of the districts. 

Figure 4.1. Percentages of minority students in small rural and other school districts in 1993-94

Figure 4.2. Numbers of small rural and other school districts in which a majority of students were members

of minorities, in 1993-94
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

41.4

54.6

47.3

64.9

Rural districts Nonrural districts

0

20

40

60

80

100 Percentage

Small Large

43

There has long been concern that many minority students may be relatively racially isolated

in districts with predominantly minority enrollment. Does the lower percentage of minority students

in small rural districts mean that in these districts relatively fewer minority students are in districts

with greater than 50 percent minority enrollment? Although the percentages in figure 4.3 indicate

that a smaller percentage of minority students are enrolled in districts with a “majority of minorities”

enrollment, in small rural districts, that percentage is still high: 41 percent of minority students in

small rural districts are in the 286 majority-minority districts. Although that constitutes less

isolation, numerically, than the enrollment of 65 percent of minority students in 917 large nonrural

majority-minority districts does, it may well represent racial and ethnic segregation across greater

distances.

 

Figure 4.3. Percentages of minority students who were in districts in which a majority of students were

members of minorities, in small rural and other school districts in 1993-94

Not all minorities are equally under-represented in small rural districts. Native Americans

are, in fact, over-represented, as shown in figure 4.4. As shown in table 4.1, 10.5 percent of all

Native American students were enrolled in small rural districts in 1993-94. On the other hand, Asian

and African American students were least likely to be enrolled in small rural districts. For a complete

table of counts of different racial and ethnic groups, see table A4.1c in appendix A. As a brief

summary of the pattern of enrollment of racial and ethnic minorities compared to other students:

Native American students, and to a lesser extent white and Hispanic students, were relatively more

likely to be enrolled in small or rural districts. African American students were more frequently

enrolled in large districts, and almost all Asian students were enrolled in large nonrural districts.

Note that although the greatest numbers of all groups are enrolled in large nonrural districts, the

proportion of all Native American students who are enrolled in small rural districts is almost three

times as great as the proportion of white students who are in these districts.
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

4.2

1

5.3

12.8

2

17

0.4

3.7

Small rural districts All other districts

0

20

40

60

80

100 Percentage

Native Americans Hispanics Blacks Asians

44

Figure 4.4. Percentages of Native American, Hispanic, Asian, and African American students in small rural

and other school districts in 1993-94

Table 4.1. Percentages of racial-ethnic groups enrolled in small rural districts, compared to other districts,

in 1993-94

 Racial/Ethnic Group Small Rural Large Rural Small Nonrural Large Nonrural Total 

Native American 10.5 21.0 1.3 67.2 100.0

White 3.5 13.3 0.5 82.7 100.0

Hispanic 1.1 3.6 0.4 94.9 100.0

African American 0.3 6.5 0.1 93.1 100.0

Asian 0.3 1.5 0.2 98.0 100.0

Combined 2.6 10.6 0.5 86.3 100.0

Source: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data.

Each ethnic minority is present in small rural districts in all regions of the nation, but the

pattern is not uniform. When the percentages of ethnic minorities are compared to the percentages

of all students in small rural districts, separately by region, as in table 4.2, whites and Native

Americans are clearly over-represented in the South Central and Midwest regions. 
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

1.3 1.6 1.6

4.2

Rural districts Nonrural districts

0

5

10

15

20

25 Percentage

Small Large

45

Table 4.2. Percentage of students enrolled in small rural districts, by region and racial-ethnic group in

1993-94

 All Students Native American White Hispanic African American Asian

Northeast 1.2 1.2 1.7 0.1 0.1 0.1

Southeast 0.1 >0.05 0.1 >0.05 0.1 >0.05

South Central 5.7 21.2 8.0 2.3 2.5 0.5

Midwest 5.6 12.8 6.7 1.1 0.2 1.1

West 2.0 7.9 2.7 0.9 0.2 0.2

All regions 2.6 10.5 3.5 1.1 0.3 0.3

Source: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data.

Students with Limited English Proficiency (LEP). Students whose native language is not

English are evaluated by schools to determine whether they need special instruction, such as

bilingual instruction or instruction in English as a second language. Recent immigrants, including

both Hispanic and Asian students, are more likely to be determined to have limited English

proficiency, and it is of interest to know how many of the students in small rural districts are

classified as LEP. Although this information is not available directly in CCD, it is available from

the school district mapping of the 1990 decennial Census data. Although, as will be discussed later,

there were as much as 10 percent increases in Hispanic and Asian enrollments between 1990-91 and

1993-94, the 1990 Census data provide an indication of the relative incidence of LEP students in

small rural districts at the mid-point of the time span covered in this report. These estimates are

compared to percentages in other districts in figure 4.5.

Figure 4.5. Percentages of school-aged children with limited English proficiency in small rural and other

school districts in 1990-91 
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

0.7

3.5

0.8

1.7 1.1

1.9 1.8

6.1

2.5

7.5

Small rural districts All other districts

0

5

10

15

20

25 Percentage

Northeast Midwest Southeast South Central West

46

Three times as great a percentage of school-aged children were identified as LEP in large

nonrural districts as in small rural districts. This is a larger difference than would be implied by the

ratios of Hispanic students in these types of districts but similar to the combined ratios for Hispanics

and Asians (see table A4.1d). In any case, these data do not provide a clear picture of whether

limited English proficiency is more or less prevalent among Hispanic or Asian students in rural or

nonrural settings.

Prevalence of school-aged children with limited English proficiency is greater in some

regions than in others, and as shown in figure 4.6, that is true in small rural districts, as elsewhere.

There were relatively fewer LEP children in small rural districts in all major regions of the country

than in large or nonrural districts. However, this was especially true in the Northeast, South Central,

and West. In the Midwest and Southeast, there was only about a 1 percent difference between the

rates in small rural and other districts; in the other regions, large and nonrural districts served

substantially greater percentages of LEP students than small rural districts did. 

 

Figure 4.6. Percentages of school-aged children with limited English proficiency in small rural and other

school districts in 1990-91, by region

Students with Individualized Educational Programs (IEPs). Programs to provide

equitable access to a quality education for students with a variety of special needs, ranging from

moderate learning disabilities to blindness, deafness, and orthopedic disabilities, have been

implemented increasingly over the past three decades. 

The prevalence of needs for special education are reflected in reported counts of students

with the Individualized Education Programs that are required by law to be developed for each student

determined to have a special need. In 1993-94, as shown in figure 4.7, about 11 percent of students
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

11.5 13.6 11.8 10.8

Rural districts Nonrural districts

0

20

40

60

80

100 Percentage

Small Large

47

in small rural districts had IEPs. That means that there were about 130,000 students with IEPs in

the 4,238 small rural districts in the country—about 30 students per district, on average, or roughly

2 to 3 students per grade. The percentage of students in small rural districts with IEPs was similar

to the percentages in other districts.

Figure 4.7. Percentages of students with Individualized Education Programs in small rural and other school

districts in 1993-94

It is important to note that children in small rural districts are just as likely to need special

education services as children in other districts. However, researchers have found that providing

opportunities for these groups of students has been particularly difficult to implement in rural areas

for several reasons. Overall, there are relatively few special education students in each district,

which makes it hard for rural areas to meet the varied needs of their special education population

(Berkeley and Ludlow 1991). Furthermore, it can be hard to retain teachers because, in addition to

lower salaries, rural districts often have difficulty providing inservice training and other staff

development activities for special education teachers. Ballou and Podgursky (1996) have noted that,

on average, teachers in rural schools are less experienced and less likely to have advanced degrees

than other teachers.

Inadequate transportation services (often the result of geographic distances, harsh weather,

and poor roads) and lack of availability of technical resources add to the difficulty of delivery of

special education services in rural areas. Rural districts have tried to cope with these problems by

mainstreaming special education students, using technology, and creating interagency collaborative

agreements and school consortia to share services. However, these solutions occasionally create new
 Note that the percentages of students in the high poverty quartile districts are higher than 25 percent for 18

all four categories, small and large rural and nonrural, districts. The reason for this is that the quartiles are not

weighted by enrollment. The percentages of students in high poverty districts are greater than 25 percent because

high poverty districts enroll more students on average than an equal number of low or medium poverty districts.

48

problems. For instance, school consortia can result in increased travel distances for students and loss

of local control (Phelps and Prock 1991; Berkeley and Ludlow 1991).

Students in Poverty. As mentioned earlier, poverty is higher in rural areas than nonrural

areas. Since the mid-1960s, federal policies in education have recognized the need to provide

supplementary funding to school districts in high poverty areas to ensure equal access to education

for disadvantaged students. The 1990 decennial Census estimated the percentage of school-aged

children in each school district who are living in households whose incomes are below the povertyline, and this information can help to describe students in small rural districts. 

Although, like other Census measures (including percentages of children with limited English

proficiency), the poverty percentage is based on students aged 5 to 17, whether or not they are

enrolled in public schools, use of this measure to compare small rural and other public school

districts should involve relatively small error because roughly 90 percent of school-aged children are

enrolled in public schools. Finally, for the purpose of this report, this 1990 percentage has been used

as an approximation for the entire period from 1986-87 to 1993-94. Although populations of

districts change, the income distribution changes are relatively slow, so the approximations should

be reasonably close for the 3 to 4 years on either side of 1990. 

As shown in figure 4.8, between 15 and 25 percent of students in small rural districts are

estimated to be living in households with incomes below the poverty line. In the Northeast and

Midwest, the percentages in small rural districts are nearly the same as in other districts, but in the

South and West, somewhat more of the students in small rural districts are in poverty than in other

districts.

The effects of poverty on educational opportunity are not limited to a student’s immediate

household (e.g., availability of reading material, a place to study, and parental modeling of

achievement). Schools in communities with a high level of poverty have more difficulty providing

quality education for all of their students. Thus, it is of interest to look at poverty in terms of the

percentages of students enrolled in high, medium, and low poverty districts. Figure 4.9 shows the

percentages of students enrolled in the highest and lowest quarters of districts, ranked on percentage

of children in poverty. 18
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

15 15

25

21

17 16

21

17

Small rural districts All other districts

0

20

40

60

80

100 Percentage

Northeast South Midwest West

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

29.8 32.4

28.1 30.4

13.6

25.4

18.1

26.8

Small rural

districts

Small nonrural

districts

Large rural

districts

Large nonrural

districts

0

20

40

60

80

100 Percentage

Highest poverty Lowest poverty

49

Figure 4.8. Estimated percentages of students in poverty in small rural and other school districts in 1993-94,

by region

Note: To compute the percentages in this figure, the estimated number of students in poverty in each public school district in 1993-94 is assumed equal

to the 1990 decennial Census percentage of school—aged children in poverty within that district’s boundaries, times the 1993-94 enrollment in the

district. 

Figure 4.9. Percentages of students in small rural and other districts who are in the highest and lowest

quarters of districts, ranked on poverty percentage, in 1993-94
 However, for descriptive purposes, three tables in appendix A (A4.4, A4.5a, and A4.5b) display poverty 19

percentages across the 8 years, combining CCD data on changing total enrollments in each district with 1990 values

for the percentage of children in poverty in that district. That is, the trends are defined to be consistent with the

assumption that poverty rates for individual districts remained constant over the period. They are intended to

indicate whether enrollments grew faster in high-poverty or low-poverty districts over this period.

50

Although the percentages of students enrolled in highest poverty districts are about the same

(30 percent) in small rural districts as in other districts, the percentages of students in low poverty

districts is much lower in both large and small rural districts than in nonrural districts. More

specifically, only 14 percent of students in small rural districts are enrolled in the lowest poverty

quartile (i.e., richest) districts, compared to 27 percent of students in large nonrural districts. That

is, at the district level, the distinction is not that small rural districts are more likely to have students

in poverty, but that they are less likely than nonrural districts to include affluent families.

Trends in Student Populations in Small Rural Districts from 1986-87 to 1993-94

As reported in the preceding chapters, the numbers of small rural schools and school districts

were declining from 1986-87 to 1993-94, while, especially at the end of this period, enrollments

were increasing (although not as fast as in other districts). Did decreases or increases in enrollments

of particular groups of students follow the same patterns in small rural districts as in other districts?

 Data on percentages of children in households with income below the poverty line and on

percentages of school-aged children with limited English proficiency were only available for a single

year, from the 1990 decennial Census. Therefore, no trend analyses were performed to determine

whether variation in district LEP percentages were related to enrollment growth or other trends in

small rural districts. 19

Minority Students. Counts of African American, Hispanic, Asian, and Native American

students have been reported in the Common Core of Data since 1987-88. As shown in figure 4.10,

the numbers of minority students generally grew about 10 percent faster than the numbers of white

students between 1987-88 and 1993-94, but not in small rural districts, where the percentages were

essentially constant across years. Thus, while the percent minority overall rose from 30.5 percent

to 33.9 percent, it stayed between 11 percent and 12 percent in small rural districts. 
1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

20

40

60

80

100 Percentage

Small rural districts

Small nonrural districts

Large nonrural districts

Large rural districts

11.9%

17.1%

21.5%

36.7%

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

51

Figure 4.10. Percentage of minority students in small rural and other school districts, 1987-88 to 1993-94

The specific patterns of increased and decreased enrollment of African Americans, Hispanics,

Asians, and Native Americans in large and small rural and nonrural districts are shown in figure

4.11. With the exception of Hispanics, the changes follow a simple pattern: the larger the

percentage in 1987-88, the greater the growth in percentage between 1987-88 and 1993-94: African

American (percentage) enrollment increased in large nonrural districts, where it was already highest,

Asian enrollment increased in nonrural districts, especially in large ones, where it was already

highest, and Native American enrollment increased most in small rural districts, where it was already

highest. Hispanic (percentage) enrollment increased in all four categories of districts and increased

most in nonrural districts, where it was already highest. However, although the highest percentage

of Hispanic students was in large nonrural districts in 1987-88, there was a greater percentage

increase in small nonrural districts. Nevertheless, the general pattern was not one of increased

mixing of racial and ethnic minorities across the rural-nonrural boundary during this period.

Simultaneously, as can be seen indirectly in figure 4.10 and directly in table A4.1b, the decline in

percentages of white enrollment were largest in nonrural districts, where the white percentage

enrollment was already lower in 1987-88. Thus, the racial and ethnic differentiation between small

and large rural and nonrural districts was greater in 1993-94 than it was in 1987-88.
17.7 17.9

10.5 10.2

5.3

4.5

2.8

2

0

5

10

15

20 Percentage

1987 1993

Blacks

11.1

13.9

3.3

4.3

6.6

12.4

4.5

5.3

0

5

10

15

20 Percentage

1987 1993

Hispanics

0.7 0.8

2 2.1

2.9 3.1

3.7

4.2

0

2

4

6

8

10 Percentage

1987 1993

Native Americans

0

2

4

6

8

10 Percentage

1987 1993

Asians

3.4

4.1

1

1.5

0.5 0.5

0.4

(large, rural)

(small, rural)

52

Figure 4.11. Percentage of minority students in small rural and other school districts, 1987-88 and 1993-94,

by racial-ethnic group
1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

5

10

15

20

25 Percentage

Small rural districts

Small nonrural districts

Large nonrural districts

Large rural districts

11.5%

11.8%

13.6%

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data

10.8%

Special education counts in the Common Core of Data were incomplete in the early years of this period. 20

In some years, certain states reported no IEP counts, and for two states, no IEP counts were reported in any of the

years. For those two states, data obtained directly from the states were used for this report; and for all states, missing

and uniform zero reports were replaced with statistically imputed values.

53

Students with Individualized Education Programs (IEPs). The number of students

reported as having IEPs in small rural districts increased from 110,000 to 130,000 between 1987-88

and 1993-94. This represents an annual 2.9 percent rate of increase, slightly smaller than the 20

3.8 percent increase in other districts. Students with IEPs increased at a faster rate than overall

enrollment in small rural districts. As a result, as shown in figure 4.12, the percentage of students

with IEPs in small rural districts increased from slightly less than 10 percent in 1987-88 to

11.5 percent in 1993-94. Clearly, more students’ special needs were being identified in small rural

districts, as they were in other districts, as time passed. As pointed out earlier, in 1993-94, the

percentages in small rural districts were similar to percentages in other districts, and the relative

change over time is comparable as well.

Figure 4.12. Percentage of students with Individualized Education Programs in small rural and other school

districts, 1987-88 to 1993-94.
If the definition of small rural education were expanded to include large rural districts with a majority of 21

small schools, the total number of students in small rural districts would be increased by 30 percent, but there would

be few differences in the findings. Under the expanded definition, the percentage of minority students would be 13

percent rather than 12 percent; the percentage of African American students in these districts would be 3 percent

instead of 2 percent.

With the inclusion of large districts with a majority of small schools, the trends would essentially be the 22

same, although the annual increases in the percentage of students with IEPs would have been more like other districts

at 3.1 percent rather than 2.9 percent. 

54

Summary

Focusing the snapshot of small rural school districts in 1993-94 on the students in schools

in those districts reveals the following patterns.

About 1,100,000 of the nation’s 43,200,000 public school students

were enrolled in small rural districts. More of the students in small

rural districts were either white or Native American than elsewhere,

while fewer were Asian or African American; and although more than

50,000 Hispanic students were enrolled in small rural districts,

relatively more were enrolled in urban districts. Fewer of the schoolaged children in small or rural districts were reported as having limited

English proficiency; however, slightly more of the students in small

rural districts were reported to have Individualized Education Programs

to address special educational needs. As a national average, relatively

more children in small rural districts were living in poverty, but this

pattern only occurred in the South Central, Southeast, and West.

Overall, it was not the case that more of the students in small rural

districts were attending schools in the highest poverty districts; rather,

fewer were in the most affluent districts (14 percent, compared to

27 percent in large nonrural districts). 21

Extending this picture to trends over the preceding 7 years reveals additional patterns.

During the latter part of this period, enrollments increased in small rural

districts, although not as fast as elsewhere. Although the percentage of

minority enrollment increased by 10 percent overall (from 31 percent

to 34 percent), it remained constant in small rural districts, at about

12 percent. While the percentage of Native Americans in small rural

districts grew, the percentages of Asians and blacks in these districts

declined. Finally, between 1987-88 and 1993-94, there were gradual

increases in the proportion of students with Individualized Education

Programs (IEPs) in small rural districts, as elsewhere.22
 For 1992-93, per pupil revenues and expenditures for 16 percent of small rural districts (and 13 23

percent of all districts) were imputed, primarily based on data for the same districts in 1991-92, in which

fewer than 2 percent were imputed. The same pattern of results held for both 1991-92 and 1992-93.

55

5. Revenues, Expenditures, and Student/Teacher Ratios in Small

Rural School Districts

In 1992-93, revenue per pupil was about $6,200, and 23

expenditures per pupil were about $6,000 in small rural districts,

about $200 to $400 more than in large nonrural districts (figures

5.1, 5.2). In rural areas, it was in large districts rather than

small districts that revenue and expenditures suffered. Per-pupil

spending varied substantially between regions: in the West,

small rural districts spent nearly $2,000 per pupil more than

other districts did; but in the Midwest, unlike the rest of the

country, except perhaps in the Southeast, less was spent in small

rural districts than in other districts (table 5.1). 

Nearly half the revenue in small rural districts came, each, from

local and state sources, with about 7 percent from the federal

government (figure 5.5). In large rural districts, by comparison,

a much smaller share came from local sources. About two-thirds

of the current expenditures in small rural districts were for core

instruction, slightly less than elsewhere (figure 5.6).

Nevertheless, ratios of students to teachers were lowest in small

rural districts, ranging from 12 in top quartile spending districts

to 15 in bottom quartile spending districts (figure 5.9).

Adjusted for inflation, trends between 1989-90 and 1992-93 were

minor, although there were a few patterns. The slightly greater

spending in small rural districts, compared to other districts in

1992-93, was more noticeable than it was 3 years earlier (figure

5.11). In the South Central region, per-pupil revenues in small

rural districts rose, but in the Northeast, per-pupil expenditures

declined somewhat (table 5.3). In the nation as a whole,

however, there were no substantial trends in per-pupil revenue

or expenditures or in student/teacher ratios.
56
57

Background

 During most of this century, powerful economic and social changes have taken place in rural

America. As the economy has changed so that agriculture no longer is a major source of

employment and income, rural areas have experienced an outmigration (DeYoung 1994; Stern 1994).

Over the last 30 years, the proportion of the population that is of working age (i.e., 18 to 64) has

continued to be higher in metropolitan areas than in rural ones, and the older segment of the

population has increased more in rural than in metropolitan areas (Herzog and Pittman 1995).

Overall poverty rates in rural areas have historically exceeded those of urban areas of the country;

however, in the previous chapter we saw that in the 1990s this rural disadvantage, as felt by small

districts, was primarily in the South and West.

Because of these factors, rural districts typically serve poorer populations with greater needs;

they exist in areas with lower property values and therefore have a much smaller tax base for local

educational funding; and they often do not have the requisite funding to provide more than the most

basic educational program for their students. As a result, they have been continually encouraged to

consolidate as a response to funding limitations and inadequate educational services (Bass 1990;

Thompson 1990; DeYoung 1994; Verstegen 1990). In fact, school and district consolidations have

been the single policy option used throughout the 20th century to try to achieve cost savings and

improve education in rural districts (Stephens 1988). On the other hand, many small rural districts

and schools offer environments that educational reformers have recently touted as effective for

fostering positive student outcomes. These aspects include strong school and community

partnerships, decentralized governance structures, low student/teacher ratios, and cultures

characterized as adaptive, flexible, and innovative in providing educational services with limited

resources (Haas and Lambert 1995; Stern 1995).

According to Stern (1994), rural residents pay a greater than average share of their income

for schooling, even though poverty is high in rural areas (one-quarter of rural children lived in

poverty in 1986). Furthermore, previous research has shown a systematic effect of rural location on

public school spending (Parrish, Matsumoto, and Fowler 1995) even after adjusting for varying costs

and needs across school districts. As for sources of funding, Parrish, Matsumoto, and Fowler (1995)

also documented discrepancies in expenditures across districts.

In this chapter, questions are addressed concerning whether size and characteristics of small

rural districts are translated into lower per-pupil revenues and expenditures and higher

student/teacher ratios. By setting a higher local funding priority on education and by using extra

state and federal funds targeted to help rural areas, is it possible for small rural districts to achieve

the same levels of resources as other districts? To what extent do they obtain revenues from state

and federal governments; and to what extent do their expenditures focus on core instructional costs?
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data; Bureau of the Census, 

 F-33 Survey of Local Governments

$6220

$6548

$5223

$5846

Small rural Small nonrural Large rural Large nonrural

$0

$1000

$2000

$3000

$4000

$5000

$6000

$7000 Revenue $ / Pupil

These comparisons do not take into account either different prices paid for educational resources (e.g., 24

teacher salaries) or different resource needs (e.g., transportation costs). However, an auxiliary analysis was carried

out adjusting revenues and expenditures for the district Teacher Cost Index developed by Chambers (1995). The

results of those analyses indicated that salaries for comparably qualified teachers were lower in small rural districts

than elsewhere. 

58

Revenues, Expenditures and Student/Teacher Ratios in Small Rural School Districts 

in 1992-93

Per-Pupil Revenues and Expenditures. School districts annually report both revenues and

expenditures to NCES as part of the F-33 Census of Governments. Although revenues and

expenditures, in aggregate, should conform to very similar patterns across school districts as these

districts respond to budget balancing pressures, they are analyzed differently—revenues in terms of

sources (local, state, and federal) and expenditures in terms of school processes (instruction, support,

and capital outlays). These data can be used to portray the financial status of small rural school

districts and how they differ from other districts. 

As can be seen in figures 5.1 and 5.2, both revenues and expenditures per pupil were greater

in small districts than in large districts but less in rural districts than in nonrural districts. As a result

of the offsetting combination of these two factors, average revenues and expenditures per pupil were

higher in small rural districts than in large nonrural districts (revenues by $374/pupil and

expenditures by $207/pupil). Thus, even though the percentages of students living in poverty were

greater in small rural districts in some regions of the nation, public school finances in the small

districts in rural areas were not significantly depressed. In rural areas, it is the large districts that 24

lag substantially in revenues and expenditures per pupil.

 

Figure 5.1. Average per-pupil revenues in small rural and other school districts in 1992-93
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data; Bureau of the Census,

 F-33 Survey of Local Governments

$5978 $6164

$5161

$5771

Small rural Small nonrural Large rural Large nonrural

$0

$1000

$2000

$3000

$4000

$5000

$6000

$7000 Expenditure $ / Pupil

59

Figure 5.2. Average per-pupil expenditures in small rural and other school districts in 1992-93

Another way to look at per-pupil revenues and expenditures is to divide the public school

districts in the nation into high (top 25 percent), medium, and low (bottom 25 percent) revenue and

expenditure districts. The question concerns the extent to which the high versus low revenue and

expenditure districts are small and rural. What percentage of small rural district students attend

schools in top and bottom quartile districts? The results shown in figures 5.3 and 5.4 indicate that

in 1992-93, the distributions of students in top and bottom quartile districts were not very different

from most school districts: about 23 percent of students in small rural districts were in districts in

the top quartile. Large rural districts, on the other hand, were much more likely to have low perpupil revenues and expenditures than other districts. Only 8.1 percent of students in large rural

districts were in top quartile districts on revenue, only 9.5 percent on expenditure. 
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data;

 Bureau of the Census, F-33 Survey of Local Government

18.1 16.3

39

23.5

59.1 58.1

52.9

59.1

22.9

25.6

8.1

17.4

Small rural Small nonrural Large rural Large nonrural

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70 Percentage

Low $ Medium $ High $

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data;

 Bureau of the Census, F-33 Survey of Local Governments

19.3

21.8

36.4

22

60.4

53.4 54.1

58.3

20.3

24.8

9.5

19.7

Small rural Small nonrural Large rural Large nonrural

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70 Percentage

Low $ Medium $ High $

60

Figure 5.3. Percentages of students in small rural and other school districts with low, medium, and high

per-pupil revenues in 1992-93

Figure 5.4. Percentages of students in small rural and other school districts with low, medium, and high

per-pupil expenditures in 1992-93
The expenditure differential in the Southeast is based on too few small rural districts (n=16) to be 25

reliable. As shown in appendix B, however, when all unified districts with high school enrollments of less than 100

per grade are considered small, the mean per-pupil revenue and expenditures in small rural districts in the Southeast

were both about $100 less than in other districts in the Southeast. 

61

Regional Variation. There are substantial regional variations in per-pupil revenues, and

similarly in per-pupil expenditures. However, the patterns of variation are different in small rural

districts, when compared to all other districts in the region. As shown in table 5.1, small rural

districts fare best on this criterion in the West: when compared to their larger and nonrural

counterparts, they spend nearly $2,000 more per student. Less striking, but still substantial, are the

differences between the Midwest and the rest of the country. In the Midwest, where there are more

small rural districts than in any other region, these districts are able to spend less per student than

larger or nonrural districts. In the other three regions of the country, revenues and expenditures perpupil are greater in small rural districts than in other districts. 25

Table 5.1. Per-pupil revenues and expenditures in small rural districts, compared to all other districts, by

region, in 1992-93

 Region Small Rural Districts All Other Districts 

Revenues per pupil

 Northeast $8,589 $7,980

 Southeast -- $5,026

 South Central $6,590 $5,374

 Midwest $5,427 $5,755

 West $7,058 $5,150

Expenditures per pupil

 Northeast $8,204 $7,850

 Southeast -- $4,965

 South Central $5,369 $4,902

 Midwest $5,587 $5,763

 West $7,006 $5,204

Source: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data; Bureau of the Census, F-33 Survey of 

 Local Government

Note: -- There were too few small rural districts in the Southeast to compute a reliable estimate.

Although they are not attributable to any single large state in a region, regional variations

reflect substantial state-to-state differences in per-pupil revenues and expenditures, which are

presented in tables A5.3b and A5.8b in appendix A. In 15 states, the average per-pupil revenues in

small rural districts in 1992-93 were at least $1,000 more than the overall average for all districts in

the state: in the West, Alaska, Washington, Idaho, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, California, Arizona,

New Mexico, and Texas; in the Northeast, New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New Hampshire,

and Maine. On the other hand, in the Midwestern states of Illinois, Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee,

Ohio, and Michigan, per-pupil revenues were at least $500 less in small rural districts than in other

districts. Regional clustering of the states where small rural districts have higher and lower revenues

per-pupil is striking. Further research is needed to understand state-to-state variation in the funding

of small rural districts. 
There is an apparent paradox in table 5.2, that small rural unified districts, which combine elementary 26

and secondary education, have lower per-pupil revenues and expenditures than elementary districts. This reflects the

combined effects of regional variation in the prevalence of elementary districts (see table A2.3b in appendix A) and

in average spending. There were relatively larger percentages of elementary districts, compared to unified districts,

among small rural districts in regions with relatively higher spending: the Northeast and West.

62

Grade Level Variations. Greater per-pupil expenditures are generally thought to be required

for a quality high school education than for elementary school, and information on the relative size

of the differential in small rural districts as compared to other districts can shed light on the ways

resources are allocated in rural areas. However, because the Common Core of Data financial

information is only available at the district level, the comparison of costs at elementary and

secondary levels can only be based on the relatively small number of separate elementary and

secondary districts. Based on this subset of districts, small rural secondary districts have per-pupil

revenues of $556 and per-pupil expenditures of $1,199 more than small rural elementary districts,

as shown in table 5.2. Generally, small rural elementary districts outspend other elementary districts

by roughly $1,000 per-pupil; while secondary and unified small rural districts only outspend their

larger, nonrural counterparts by $100 to $300 per pupil on average. 26

Table 5.2. Per-pupil revenues and expenditures in small rural districts, compared to all other districts, by

grade level served, in 1992-93

 Region Small rural Districts All Other Districts 

Revenues per pupil

 Elementary $6,917 $5,608

 Unified $6,104 $5,753

 Secondary $7,473 $7,369

Expenditures per pupil

 Elementary $6,369 $5,470

 Unified $5,876 $5,683

 Secondary $7,568 $7,286

Source: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data; Bureau of the Census, F-33 Survey of 

 Local Governments.

Revenue Sources. Revenues for public schools come essentially from three sources: local

government, state government, and the federal government. As shown in figure 5.5, the share of

revenues in small rural districts from state and local sources were each between 40 and 50 percent

in 1992-93, with a 6 to 7 percent share from federal programs. These percentages are about the same

as percentages in other districts. In rural areas, it is the large districts, which have greater poverty

and lower overall revenues, that rely on state and federal sources for a larger share of their revenue.

Expenditure Allocations. Just as there were small but noticeable differences in revenue

sources between small and large rural and nonrural districts, there were also small but noticeable

differences in the allocation of expenditures for different purposes. On the Bureau of Census F-33

form, which provides school district financial data for the Common Core of Data, total expenditures

were reported, as were the subset of those expenditures that were current expenditures and the subset
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data; 

Bureau of the Census, F-33 Survey of Local Governments

44.2

50.2

38.1

49 48.5

44.7

54.5

45.4

6.8

5.2

7.4 6.1

Small rural Small nonrural Large rural Large nonrural

0

10

20

30

40

50

60 Percentage

Local State Federal

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data;

 Bureau of the Census, F-33 Survey of Local Governments

58.2 59 59.8

62.3

29.5 28 27.9 26.7

12.3 13 12.3 11

Small rural Small nonrural Large rural Large nonrural

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70 Percentage

Core Support Capital

63

of current expenditures that were for core instructional services (see figure 5.6). A shorthand way

of looking at this is to think of “current expenditures not for core instruction” as support

expenditures, and “non-current expenditures” as capital expenditures.

Figure 5.5. Percentages of revenues in small rural and other school districts from local, state, and federal

sources in 1992-93

Figure 5.6. Percentages of expenditures in small rural and other school districts for core instruction,

administrative support, and capital outlays in 1992-93
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data;

 Bureua of the Census, F-33 Survey of Local Governments

13.3

14

16.8

17.8

Small rural Small nonrural Large rural Large nonrural

0

5

10

15

20 Ratio Student/teacher ratios

64

In 1992-93, expenditures were allocated roughly the same across types of districts—about

62 percent for core instruction, 27 percent for support, and 11 percent for capital outlay. However,

there was a tendency for large nonrural districts to allocate somewhat more for core instruction, and

as a result, small rural districts were spending less of their funds on core instruction than large

nonrural districts (58.2 percent versus 62.3 percent). 

Student/Teacher Ratios. The most important resource purchased by schools is teachers’

time, and small rural districts differ from other districts both in terms of the characteristics of their

teaching force and the numbers of students for which each teacher is responsible. Ballou and

Podgursky (1996) have reported analyses of the Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS) which indicate

that, in a representative sample of rural and small town schools, teachers on average earn less and

have less formal education and experience than teachers in nonrural schools. On the other hand, as

shown in figure 5.7, small rural districts had lower student/teacher ratios in 1993-94 than other

districts. The effects of district size are substantial—average student/teacher ratios are about 14 in

small districts and 17 in large districts. Thus, there appears to be a trade-off between quality, as

measured by formal teacher qualifications, and quantity, as measured by the “share” of each teacher

available to a student, between small rural districts and large nonrural districts. 

Figure 5.7. Average student/teacher ratios in small rural and other school districts in 1992-93

Differences in average student/teacher ratios are associated with differences in per-pupil

revenues and expenditures, as shown in figures 5.8 and 5.9. Small rural districts in the top quartile

of per-pupil revenues and expenditures had only about 12 students per teacher, compared to a 15-to-1

ratio in the bottom quartile. This is not surprising, because the largest component of school

expenditures is for teachers. However, it does show that in small rural districts, as elsewhere, real
SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data;

 Bureau of the Census, F-33 Survey of Local Governments

14.7

17.2 17.7

19.3

14.1

15.1

16.8

18.4

11.6

10.9

14.9 15.5

Small rural Small nonrural Large rural Large nonrural

0

5

10

15

20

25 Ratio

Low Medium High

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data;

 Bureau of the Census, F-33 Survey of Local Governments

15.4

16.9

17.8

19

13.9

14.7

16.8

18.5

11.6 11.1

15.2 15.8

Small rural Small nonrural Large rural Large nonrural

0

5

10

15

20

25 Ratio

Low Medium High

65

resources are related to funding levels. The relationship between school size and student/teacher

ratios appears as strong as between funding levels and these ratios: small rural districts in the bottom

quartile on spending per pupil had lower student/teacher ratios than large nonrural districts in the top

quartile. 

Figure 5.8. Average student/teacher ratios in small rural and other school districts with low, medium, and

high per-pupil revenues in 1992-93

Figure 5.9. Average student/teacher ratios in small rural and other school districts with low, medium, and

high per-pupil expenditures in 1992-93
1989 1990 1991 1992

$0

$1,000

$2,000

$3,000

$4,000

$5,000

$6,000

$7,000

Small rural districts

Small nonrural districts

Large rural districts

Large nonrural districts

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data;

 Bureau of the Census, F-33 Survey of Local Government

$6,220

$6,548

$5,223

$5,846

The annual inflation ratios used were 1.054 for 1989-90 to 1990-91, 1.042 for 1990-91 to 1991-92, and 27

1.030 for 1991-92 to 1992-93.

66

Trends in Revenues, Expenditures, and Student/Teacher Ratios in Small Rural School

Districts between 1989-90 and 1992-93

Per-pupil revenue and expenditure in current dollars tend to increase with the inflation rate,

and a correction has been applied to these data so that all years are measured in constant dollars, set

to the value in 1992-93. Once corrected for inflation, per-pupil revenues and expenditures 27

exhibited very little change in small rural districts between 1989-90 and 1992-93. As can be seen

in figure 5.10, in all 4 years, revenues per student in small rural districts were slightly greater than

in large nonrural districts, substantially greater than those of large rural districts, and somewhat less

than in small nonrural districts.

Figure 5.10. Trends in per-pupil revenues in small rural and other school districts between 1989-1990 and

1992-93 (in constant 1992-93 dollars)

The average per-pupil expenditure in small rural schools, adjusted for inflation, varied only

between $5,950 and $6,120 during these four years. Trends in average per-pupil expenditures in

small rural districts are compared with trends in other districts in figure 5.11. (The complete data

are shown in table A5.7 in the appendix.) The difference favoring small rural districts over large

nonrural districts increased from $13 in 1989-90 to $207 in 1992-93 (see table A5.7), as much

because spending in large nonrural districts did not keep up with inflation as that spending increased

in small rural districts. 
1989 1990 1991 1992

$0

$1,000

$2,000

$3,000

$4,000

$5,000

$6,000

$7,000 Per-pupil expenditures

Small rural districts

Small nonrural districts

Large rural districts

Large nonrural districts

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data;

 Bureau of the Census, F-33 Survey of Local Governments

$5,978

$6,164

$5,161

$5,771

An examination of regional CPI measures indicates that this differential loss, in comparison to other 28

regions, is not a reflection of differential inflation rates. Although there were too few small rural districts in the

Southeast for reliable estimation, when unified districts with fewer than 100 students per high school grade were

included in the definition of “small districts” (see appendix B), there was a gain of about $250 in per-pupil

expenditures in small rural districts in the Southeast over this period. 

67

Figure 5.11. Trends in per-pupil expenditures in small rural and other school districts between 1989-90 and

1992-93 (in constant 1992-93 dollars)

Regional Variation. As shown in table 5.3, gains in per-pupil spending varied by region.

Small rural districts in the Northeast, which in 1989-90 had the highest per-pupil expenditures, lost

ground over this period as did other districts in the Northeast, but as shown in table A5.8 they still

remained the highest spending region in 1992-93.28

Table 5.3. Per-pupil expenditure gains in small rural districts, compared to all other districts, by region,

from 1989-90 to 1992-93 (in constant 1992-93 dollars)

 Region Small rural Districts All Other Districts 

Gain in expenditures per pupil

 Northeast – $548 – $325

 Southeast -- – $315

 South Central $48 $19

 Midwest $113 $107

 West – $315 – $250

Source: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data; Bureau of the Census, F-33 Survey of 

 Local Governments.

Note: -- There were too few small rural districts in the Southeast to support a reliable estimate.
1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992 1993

0

5

10

15

20

25 Student/teacher ratios

Small rural districts

Small nonrural districts

Large nonrural districts

Large rural districts

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data;

 Bureau of the Census, F-33 Survey of Local Governments

13.3

14.0

16.8

17.8

68

Student/Teacher Ratios. On a nationwide basis, changes in per-pupil revenues and

expenditures in small rural districts over this time period were relatively minor, and that is reflected

in the lack of changes in student/teacher ratios, shown in figure 5.12. Average student/teacher ratios

in small rural districts remained at about 13 throughout the period from 1986-87 to 1993-94, while,

for example, the average ratios in large nonrural districts remained at about 18. 

Figure 5.12. Trends in student/teacher ratios in small rural and other school districts between 1986-87 and

1993-94
Including large rural districts with a majority of small schools in the small rural category had little effect 29

on the results. Average spending in the expanded set of small rural districts was about $100 to $150 less per-pupil

but still slightly higher than in other districts. Generally, summary figures for small rural districts were, as expected,

slightly closer to figures for large rural districts. 

 Trends were not substantially affected by the inclusion of large rural districts with a majority of small 30

schools. For example, over the three-year period there was a negligible average loss of $50 in per-pupil

expenditures in the expanded set of small rural districts, compared to $200 in large nonrural districts. The

corresponding loss for the originally defined small rural districts was negligible ($6).

69

Summary

Focusing the snapshot of small rural school districts in 1992-93 on revenue, expenditures,

and student/teacher ratios in those districts reveals the following patterns.

Revenue per pupil was about $6,200, and expenditures per pupil were

about $6,000 in small rural districts, about $200 to $400 more than in

large nonrural districts. In rural areas, it was in large districts rather

than small districts that revenue and expenditures suffered, relative

to nonrural districts. Per-pupil spending varied substantially between

regions: in the West, small rural districts spent nearly $2,000 per

pupil more than other districts did; but in the Midwest, unlike the rest

of the country, less was spent in small rural districts than elsewhere.

Nationally, 93 percent of the revenue in small rural districts came

almost equally from local sources (44 percent) and state sources

(49 percent), with about 7 percent from the federal government. In

large rural districts, by comparison, a much smaller share came from

local sources. About two-thirds of the current expenditures in small

rural districts were for core instruction, slightly less than elsewhere.

Nevertheless, ratios of students to teachers were lowest in small rural

districts, ranging from 12 in top spending districts to 15 in bottom

spending districts.29

Extending this picture to longitudinal trends over the preceding 3 years does not reveal a

great deal of additional information. Adjusted for inflation, trends are minor, although there were

a few patterns.

The slightly greater spending in small rural districts, compared to

other districts in 1992-93, grew from essentially no difference 3 years

earlier. In the South Central region, per-pupil revenues in small rural

districts increased, but in the Northeast, per-pupil expenditures

declined somewhat. As a national average, however, there were no

substantial changes in per-pupil revenue or expenditures or in

student/teacher ratios.30
70
71

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Monk, D.H. (1991). “The organization and reorganization of small rural schools.” In Rural

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74
75

Appendix A. Tables Section 
76
77

Table A2.1. Number of rural, small, and other school districts, by level and year

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Elem Unified Second Total Elem Unified Second Total Elem Unified Second

Total

1986-87 15,345 3,824 10,879 642 7,409 1,919 5,229 261 7,936 1,905 5,650 381

1987-88 15,273 3,772 10,861 640 7,387 1,905 5,223 259 7,886 1,867 5,638 381

1988-89 15,199 3,716 10,846 637 7,353 1,880 5,215 258 7,846 1,836 5,631 379

1989-90 15,113 3,652 10,825 636 7,305 1,843 5,204 258 7,808 1,809 5,621 378

1990-91 15,035 3,599 10,806 630 7,260 1,809 5,198 253 7,775 1,790 5,608 377

1991-92 14,956 3,537 10,789 630 7,207 1,773 5,183 251 7,749 1,764 5,606 379

1992-93 14,820 3,436 10,748 636 7,091 1,704 5,136 251 7,729 1,732 5,612 385

1993-94 14,648 3,334 10,683 631 6,979 1,645 5,085 249 7,669 1,689 5,598 382

Small

1986-87 5,679 2,217 3,192 270 4,653 1,529 2,906 218 1,026 688 286 52

1987-88 5,608 2,171 3,170 267 4,626 1,515 2,895 216 982 656 275 51

1988-89 5,543 2,125 3,155 263 4,593 1,491 2,887 215 950 634 268 48

1989-90 5,469 2,073 3,133 263 4,546 1,458 2,873 215 923 615 260 48

1990-91 5,402 2,023 3,120 259 4,505 1,425 2,868 212 897 598 252 47

1991-92 5,333 1,970 3,106 257 4,457 1,394 2,852 211 876 576 254 46

1992-93 5,204 1,888 3,057 259 4,351 1,339 2,802 210 853 549 255 49

1993-94 5,052 1,809 2,986 257 4,238 1,290 2,740 208 814 519 246 49

Large

1986-87 9,666 1,607 7,687 372 2,756 390 2,323 43 6,910 1,217 5,364 329

1987-88 9,665 1,601 7,691 373 2,761 390 2,328 43 6,904 1,211 5,363 330

1988-89 9,656 1,591 7,691 374 2,760 389 2,328 43 6,896 1,202 5,363 331

1989-90 9,644 1,579 7,692 373 2,759 385 2,331 43 6,885 1,194 5,361 330

1990-91 9,633 1,576 7,686 371 2,755 384 2,330 41 6,878 1,192 5,356 330

1991-92 9,623 1,567 7,683 373 2,750 379 2,331 40 6,873 1,188 5,352 333

1992-93 9,616 1,548 7,691 377 2,740 365 2,334 41 6,876 1,183 5,357 336

1993-94 9,596 1,525 7,697 374 2,741 355 2,345 41 6,855 1,170 5,352 333
78

Table A2.2. Number of students (in thousands) enrolled in rural, small, and other school districts, by level

and year

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Elem Unified Second Total Elem Unified Second Total Elem Unified Second

Total

1986-87 39,588 2,165 36,404 1,019 5,400 272 5,064 64 34,188 1,893 31,340 955

1987-88 39,751 2,207 36,555 989 5,398 281 5,054 63 34,353 1,926 31,501 926

1988-89 39,941 2,260 36,724 957 5,410 282 5,067 61 34,531 1,978 31,657 896

1989-90 40,311 2,339 37,026 946 5,423 286 5,077 60 34,888 2,053 31,949 886

1990-91 40,971 2,426 37,590 955 5,454 293 5,103 58 35,517 2,133 32,487 897

1991-92 41,811 2,484 38,342 985 5,534 297 5,177 60 36,277 2,187 33,165 925

1992-93 42,571 2,526 39,028 1,017 5,629 297 5,267 65 36,942 2,229 33,761 952

1993-94 43,196 2,562 39,600 1,034 5,710 294 5,346 70 37,486 2,268 34,254 964

Small

1986-87 1,294 164 1,087 43 1,123 107 987 29 171 57 100 14

1987-88 1,276 159 1,076 41 1,113 104 981 28 163 55 95 13

1988-89 1,291 179 1,071 41 1,109 106 976 27 182 73 95 14

1989-90 1,293 185 1,068 40 1,109 107 975 27 184 78 93 13

1990-91 1,293 188 1,066 39 1,107 108 973 26 186 80 93 13

1991-82 1,309 190 1,078 41 1,119 109 982 28 190 81 96 13

1992-93 1,325 191 1,088 46 1,131 109 990 32 194 82 98 14

1993-94 1,327 190 1,087 50 1,131 107 988 36 196 83 99 14

Large

1986-87 38,294 2,001 35,317 976 4,277 165 4,077 35 34,017 1,836 31,240 941

1987-88 38,475 2,048 35,479 948 4,285 177 4,073 35 34,190 1,871 31,406 913

1988-89 38,650 2,081 35,653 916 4,301 176 4,091 34 34,349 1,905 31,562 882

1989-90 39,018 2,154 35,958 906 4,314 179 4,102 33 34,704 1,975 31,856 873

1990-91 39,678 2,238 36,524 916 4,347 185 4,130 32 35,331 2,053 32,394 884

1991-92 40,502 2,294 37,264 944 4,415 188 4,195 32 36,087 2,106 33,069 912

1992-93 41,246 2,335 37,940 971 4,498 188 4,277 33 36,748 2,147 33,663 938

1993-94 41,869 2,372 38,513 984 4,579 187 4,358 34 37,290 2,185 34,155 950
79

Table A2.3a. Number of rural, small, and other school districts, by region and year

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Small Large Total Small Large Total Small Large

Northeast

1986-87 2,971 589 2,382 805 419 386 2,166 170 1,996

1987-88 2,969 587 2,382 807 420 387 2,162 167 1,995

1988-89 2,963 584 2,379 806 419 387 2,157 165 1,992

1989-90 2,959 580 2,379 804 417 387 2,155 163 1,992

1990-91 2,959 579 2,380 805 417 388 2,154 162 1,992

1991-92 2,958 576 2,382 803 415 388 2,155 161 1,994

1992-93 2,957 574 2,383 801 412 389 2,156 162 1,994

1993-94 2,948 568 2,380 796 408 388 2,152 160 1,992

Southeast

1986-87 1,387 31 1,356 532 19 513 855 12 843

1987-88 1,380 29 1,351 531 17 514 849 12 837

1988-89 1,379 28 1,351 531 17 514 848 11 837

1989-90 1,373 27 1,346 530 16 514 843 11 832

1990-91 1,373 26 1,347 530 16 514 843 10 833

1991-92 1,375 32 1,343 531 17 514 844 15 829

1992-93 1,369 32 1,337 529 17 512 840 15 825

1993-94 1,353 27 1,326 527 16 511 826 11 815

South Central

1986-87 2,013 1,041 972 1,178 879 299 835 162 673

1987-88 2,003 1,030 973 1,174 874 300 829 156 673

1988-89 1,999 1,026 973 1,172 872 300 827 154 673

1989-90 1,991 1,018 973 1,166 866 300 825 152 673

1990-91 1,974 1,001 973 1,156 856 300 818 145 673

1991-92 1,948 977 971 1,141 841 300 807 136 671

1992-93 1,935 964 971 1,130 830 300 805 134 671

1993-94 1,915 944 971 1,116 815 301 799 129 670

Midwest

1986-87 5,981 2,707 3,274 3,409 2,275 1,134 2,572 432 2,140

1987-88 5,930 2,656 3,274 3,393 2,261 1,132 2,537 395 2,142

1988-89 5,878 2,607 3,271 3,367 2,236 1,131 2,511 371 2,140

1989-90 5,830 2,555 3,275 3,338 2,204 1,134 2,492 351 2,141

1990-91 5,779 2,514 3,265 3,311 2,181 1,130 2,468 333 2,135

1991-92 5,736 2,474 3,262 3,280 2,152 1,128 2,456 322 2,134

1992-93 5,644 2,381 3,263 3,198 2,078 1,120 2,446 303 2,143

1993-94 5,555 2,289 3,266 3,128 2,003 1,125 2,427 286 2,141

West

1986-87 2,993 1,311 1,682 1,485 1,061 424 1,508 250 1,258

1987-88 2,991 1,306 1,685 1,482 1,054 428 1,509 252 1,257

1988-89 2,980 1,298 1,682 1,477 1,049 428 1,503 249 1,254

1989-90 2,960 1,289 1,671 1,467 1,043 424 1,493 246 1,247

1990-91 2,950 1,282 1,668 1,458 1,035 423 1,492 247 1,245

1991-92 2,939 1,274 1,665 1,452 1,032 420 1,487 242 1,245

1992-93 2,915 1,253 1,662 1,433 1,014 419 1,482 239 1,243

1993-94 2,877 1,224 1,653 1,412 996 416 1,465 228 1,237
80

Table A2.3b. Counts of small rural and other districts at each grade level

Total Small Rural Other

Tot Elem Unified Sec Tot Elem Unified Sec Tot Elem Unified Sec

United States

1986-87 15,345 3,824 10,879 642 4,653 1,529 2,906 218 10,692 2,295 7,973 424

1987-88 15,273 3,772 10,861 640 4,626 1,515 2,895 216 10,647 2,257 7,966 424

1988-89 15,199 3,716 10,846 637 4,593 1,491 2,887 215 10,606 2,225 7,959 422

1989-90 15,113 3,652 10,825 636 4,546 1,458 2,873 215 10,567 2,194 7,952 421

1990-91 15,035 3,599 10,806 630 4,505 1,425 2,868 212 10,530 2,174 7,938 418

1991-92 14,956 3,537 10,789 630 4,457 1,394 2,852 211 10,499 2,143 7,937 419

1992-93 14,820 3,436 10,748 636 4,351 1,339 2,802 210 10,469 2,097 7,946 426

1993-94 14,648 3,334 10,683 631 4,238 1,290 2,740 208 10,410 2,044 7,943 423

Northeast

1986-87 2,971 884 1,948 139 419 261 149 9 2,552 623 1,799 130

1987-88 2,969 882 1,946 141 420 264 147 9 2,549 618 1,799 132

1988-89 2,963 878 1,942 143 419 264 146 9 2,544 614 1,796 134

1989-90 2,959 875 1,941 143 417 262 146 9 2,542 613 1,795 134

1990-91 2,959 876 1,940 143 417 262 146 9 2,542 614 1,794 134

1991-92 2,958 870 1,941 147 415 260 145 10 2,543 610 1,796 137

1992-93 2,957 864 1,939 154 412 257 144 11 2,545 607 1,795 143

1993-94 2,948 860 1,935 153 408 255 142 11 2,540 605 1,793 142

Southeast

1986-87 1,387 30 1,353 4 19 1 18 0 1,368 29 1,335 4

1987-88 1,380 30 1,346 4 17 1 16 0 1,363 29 1,330 4

1988-89 1,379 30 1,346 3 17 1 16 0 1,362 29 1,330 3

1989-90 1,373 30 1,340 3 16 1 15 0 1,357 29 1,325 3

1990-91 1,373 32 1,337 4 16 1 15 0 1,357 31 1,322 4

1991-92 1,375 32 1,339 4 17 1 16 0 1,358 31 1,323 4

1992-93 1,369 31 1,334 4 17 1 16 0 1,352 30 1,318 4

1993-94 1,353 31 1,318 4 16 1 15 0 1,337 30 1,303 4

South Central

1986-87 2,013 241 1,772 0 879 134 745 0 1,134 107 1,027 0

1987-88 2,003 237 1,766 0 874 132 742 0 1,129 105 1,024 0

1988-89 1,999 234 1,765 0 872 130 742 0 1,127 104 1,023 0

1989-90 1,991 232 1,759 0 866 128 738 0 1,125 104 1,021 0

1990-91 1,974 223 1,751 0 856 121 735 0 1,118 102 1,016 0

1991-92 1,948 212 1,736 0 841 115 726 0 1,107 97 1,010 0

1992-93 1,935 206 1,729 0 830 112 718 0 1,105 94 1,011 0

1993-94 1,915 192 1,723 0 815 104 711 0 1,100 88 1,012 0

Midwest

1986-87 5,981 1,322 4,488 171 2,275 606 1,616 53 3,706 716 2,872 118

1987-88 5,930 1,286 4,478 166 2,261 599 1,611 51 3,669 687 2,867 115

1988-89 5,878 1,248 4,467 163 2,236 582 1,604 50 3,642 666 2,863 113

1989-90 5,830 1,210 4,459 161 2,204 560 1,595 49 3,626 650 2,864 112

1990-91 5,779 1,170 4,452 157 2,181 541 1,593 47 3,598 629 2,859 110

1991-92 5,736 1,137 4,445 154 2,152 520 1,587 45 3,584 617 2,858 109

1992-93 5,644 1,076 4,414 154 2,078 489 1,546 43 3,566 587 2,868 111

1993-94 5,555 1,035 4,368 152 2,003 468 1,494 41 3,552 567 2,874 111

West

1986-87 2,993 1,347 1,318 328 1,061 527 378 156 1,932 820 940 172

1987-88 2,991 1,337 1,325 329 1,054 519 379 156 1,937 818 946 173

1988-89 2,980 1,326 1,326 328 1,049 514 379 156 1,931 812 947 172

1989-90 2,960 1,305 1,326 329 1,043 507 379 157 1,917 798 947 172

1990-91 2,950 1,298 1,326 326 1,035 500 379 156 1,915 798 947 170

1991-92 2,939 1,286 1,328 325 1,032 498 378 156 1,907 788 950 169

1992-93 2,915 1,259 1,332 324 1,014 480 378 156 1,901 779 954 168

1993-94 2,877 1,216 1,339 322 996 462 378 156 1,881 754 961 166
81

Table A2.4a. Number of rural, small, and other school districts in 1993-94, by state

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Small Large Total Small Large Total Small Large

50 States and D.C. 14,648 5,052 9,596 6,979 4,238 2,741 7,669 814 6,855

Alabama 127 0 127 38 0 38 89 0 89

Alaska 55 37 18 48 37 11 7 0 7

Arizona 216 77 139 89 55 34 127 22 105

Arkansas 313 142 171 199 132 67 114 10 104

California 1,055 271 784 282 147 135 773 124 649

Colorado 176 93 83 116 89 27 60 4 56

Connecticut 166 14 152 25 10 15 141 4 137

Delaware 19 0 19 6 0 6 13 0 13

District of Columbia 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 1

Florida 68 1 67 14 0 14 54 1 53

Georgia 181 3 178 66 3 63 115 0 115

Hawaii 1 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 1

Idaho 113 46 67 77 44 33 36 2 34

Illinois 922 261 661 336 203 133 586 58 528

Indiana 292 7 285 111 6 105 181 1 180

Iowa 398 205 193 272 196 76 126 9 117

Kansas 304 168 136 241 161 80 63 7 56

Kentucky 176 13 163 72 6 66 104 7 97

Louisiana 66 0 66 17 0 17 49 0 49

Maine 226 97 129 124 82 42 102 15 87

Maryland 24 0 24 11 0 11 13 0 13

Massachusetts 320 28 292 26 6 20 294 22 272

Michigan 558 102 456 213 80 133 345 22 323

Minnesota 399 166 233 256 156 100 143 10 133

Mississippi 149 2 147 73 2 71 76 0 76

Missouri 537 274 263 360 253 107 177 21 156

Montana 492 387 105 416 369 47 76 18 58

Nebraska 684 621 63 502 484 18 182 137 45

Nevada 17 3 14 9 3 6 8 0 8

New Hampshire 165 57 108 77 45 32 88 12 76

New Jersey 571 70 501 65 21 44 506 49 457

New Mexico 88 37 51 54 37 17 34 0 34

New York 714 142 572 197 97 100 517 45 472

North Carolina 121 0 121 51 0 51 70 0 70

North Dakota 249 217 32 232 217 15 17 0 17

Ohio 611 27 584 228 23 205 383 4 379

Oklahoma 554 357 197 351 294 57 203 63 140

Oregon 278 135 143 104 91 13 174 44 130

Pennsylvania 500 8 492 113 5 108 387 3 384

Rhode Island 36 1 35 3 1 2 33 0 33

South Carolina 95 2 93 33 2 31 62 0 62

South Dakota 174 131 43 149 130 19 25 1 24

Tennessee 138 2 136 45 1 44 93 1 92

Texas 1,048 445 603 566 389 177 482 56 426

Utah 40 5 35 17 5 12 23 0 23

Vermont 250 151 99 166 141 25 84 10 74

Virginia 133 4 129 69 2 67 64 2 62

Washington 297 119 178 175 107 68 122 12 110

West Virginia 55 0 55 32 0 32 23 0 23

Wisconsin 427 110 317 228 94 134 199 16 183

Wyoming 49 14 35 25 12 13 24 2 22
82

Table A2.4b. Percentage of rural, small, and other school districts in 1993-94, by state

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Small Large Total Small Large Total Small Large

50 States and D.C. 14,648 34.4 65.5 47.6 28.9 18.7 52.3 5.5 46.7

Alabama 127 0.0 100.0 29.9 0.0 29.9 70.0 0.0 70.0

Alaska 55 67.2 32.7 87.2 67.2 20.0 12.7 0.0 12.7

Arizona 216 35.6 64.3 41.2 25.4 15.7 58.7 10.1 48.6

Arkansas 313 45.3 54.6 63.5 42.1 21.4 36.4 3.1 33.2

California 1,052 25.6 74.3 26.7 13.9 12.7 73.2 11.7 61.5

Colorado 176 52.8 47.1 65.9 50.5 15.3 34.0 2.2 31.8

Connecticut 166 8.4 91.5 15.0 6.0 9.0 84.9 2.4 82.5

Delaware 19 0.0 100.0 31.5 0.0 31.5 68.4 0.0 68.4

District of Columbia 1 0.0 100.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 100.0 0.0 100.0

Florida 68 1.4 98.5 20.5 0.0 20.5 79.4 1.4 77.9

Georgia 181 1.6 98.3 36.4 1.6 34.8 63.5 0.0 63.5

Hawaii 1 0.0 100.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 100.0 0.0 100.0

Idaho 113 40.7 59.2 68.1 38.9 29.2 31.8 1.7 30.0

Illinois 922 28.3 71.6 36.4 22.0 14.4 63.5 6.2 57.2

Indiana 292 2.3 97.6 38.0 2.1 36.0 62.0 0.3 61.6

Iowa 398 51.5 48.4 68.3 49.2 19.0 31.6 2.2 29.3

Kansas 304 55.2 44.7 79.2 52.9 26.3 20.7 2.3 18.4

Kentucky 176 7.3 92.6 40.9 3.4 37.5 59.0 3.9 55.1

Louisiana 66 0.0 100.0 25.7 0.0 25.7 74.2 0.0 74.2

Maine 226 42.9 57.0 54.8 36.2 18.5 45.1 6.6 38.4

Maryland 24 0.0 100.0 45.8 0.0 45.8 54.1 0.0 54.1

Massachusetts 320 8.7 91.2 8.1 1.8 6.2 91.8 6.8 85.0

Michigan 558 18.2 81.7 38.1 14.3 23.8 61.8 3.9 57.8

Minnesota 399 41.6 58.3 64.1 39.0 25.0 35.8 2.5 33.3

Mississippi 149 1.3 98.6 48.9 1.3 47.6 51.0 0.0 51.0

Missouri 537 51.0 48.9 67.0 47.1 19.9 32.9 3.9 29.0

Montana 492 78.6 21.3 84.5 75.0 9.5 15.4 3.6 11.7

Nebraska 684 90.7 9.2 73.3 70.7 2.6 26.6 20.0 6.5

Nevada 17 17.6 82.3 52.9 17.6 35.2 47.0 0.0 47.0

New Hampshire 165 34.5 65.4 46.6 27.2 19.3 53.3 7.2 46.0

New Jersey 571 12.2 87.7 11.3 3.6 7.7 88.6 8.5 80.0

New Mexico 88 42.0 57.9 61.3 42.0 19.3 38.6 0.0 38.6

New York 714 19.8 80.1 27.5 13.5 14.0 72.4 6.3 66.1

North Carolina 121 0.0 100.0 42.1 0.0 42.1 57.8 0.0 57.8

North Dakota 249 87.1 12.8 93.1 87.1 6.0 6.8 0.0 6.8

Ohio 611 4.4 95.5 37.3 3.7 33.5 62.6 0.6 62.0

Oklahoma 554 64.4 35.5 63.3 53.0 10.2 36.6 11.3 25.2

Oregon 278 48.5 51.4 37.4 32.7 4.6 62.5 15.8 46.7

Pennsylvania 500 1.6 98.4 22.6 1.0 21.6 77.4 0.6 76.8

Rhode Island 36 2.7 97.2 8.3 2.7 5.5 91.6 0.0 91.6

South Carolina 95 2.1 97.8 34.7 2.1 32.6 65.2 0.0 65.2

South Dakota 174 75.2 24.7 85.6 74.7 10.9 14.3 0.5 13.7

Tennessee 138 1.4 98.5 32.6 0.7 31.8 67.3 0.7 66.6

Texas 1,048 42.4 57.5 54.0 37.1 16.8 45.9 5.3 40.6

Utah 40 12.5 87.5 42.5 12.5 30.0 57.5 0.0 57.5

Vermont 250 60.4 39.6 66.4 56.4 10.0 33.6 4.0 29.6

Virginia 133 3.0 96.9 51.8 1.5 50.3 48.1 1.5 46.6

Washington 297 40.0 59.9 58.9 36.0 22.8 41.0 4.0 29.6

West Virginia 55 0.0 100.0 58.1 0.0 58.1 41.8 0.0 41.8

Wisconsin 427 25.7 74.2 53.3 22.0 31.3 46.6 3.7 42.8

Wyoming 49 28.5 71.4 51.0 24.4 26.5 48.9 4.0 44.8
83

Table A2.4c. Percent change in rural, small, and other school districts between 1986 and 1993, by state

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Small Large Total Small Large Total Small Large

50 States and D.C. -4.6 -11.1 -0.8 -5.9 -9.0 -0.6 -3.4 -20.7 -0.8

Alabama -2.4 -100.0 -1.6 -5.0 n/a -5.0 -1.2 -100.0 0.0

Alaska 1.8 0.0 5.8 2.1 0.0 10.0 0.0 n/a 0.0

Arizona -0.5 -8.4 4.5 -4.4 -9.9 6.2 2.4 -4.4 3.9

Arkansas -6.1 -11.3 -1.2 -3.9 -6.4 1.5 -9.6 -47.4 -2.9

California -2.5 -2.9 -2.4 -1.1 -1.4 -0.8 -3.1 -4.7 -2.7

Colorado -0.6 -1.1 0.0 -0.9 -1.2 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0

Connecticut 0.6 0.0 0.6 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.7 0.0 0.7

Delaware 0.0 n/a 0.0 0.0 n/a 0.0 0.0 n/a 0.0

District of Columbia 0.0 n/a 0.0 n/a n/a n/a 0.0 n/a 0.0

Florida 1.4 n/a 0.0 0.0 n/a 0.0 1.8 n/a 0.0

Georgia -2.7 0.0 -2.8 0.0 0.0 0.0 -4.2 n/a -4.2

Hawaii 0.0 n/a 0.0 n/a n/a n/a 0.0 n/a 0.0

Idaho -1.8 -4.2 0.0 -3.8 -6.4 0.0 2.8 100.0 0.0

Illinois -7.0 -20.2 -0.5 -11.4 -17.5 0.0 -4.3 -28.4 -0.6

Indiana -3.7 -50.0 -1.4 0.9 0.0 0.9 -6.3 -87.5 -2.8

Iowa -9.0 -16.0 0.0 -11.7 -15.9 1.3 -2.4 -18.2 -0.9

Kansas 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0

Kentucky -1.2 0.0 -1.3 0.0 0.0 0.0 -1.9 0.0 -2.1

Louisiana 0.0 n/a 0.0 0.0 n/a 0.0 0.0 n/a 0.0

Maine -1.4 -1.1 -1.6 -1.6 -1.3 -2.4 -1.0 0.0 -1.2

Maryland 0.0 n/a 0.0 0.0 n/a 0.0 0.0 n/a 0.0

Massachusetts -4.8 -24.4 -2.4 -16.2 -40.0 -4.8 -3.7 -18.6 -2.2

Michigan -1.3 -6.5 0.0 -1.4 -3.7 0.0 -1.2 -15.4 0.0

Minnesota -7.9 -16.2 -0.9 -15.8 -18.8 -10.8 10.8 66.6 8.1

Mississippi -3.3 -33.4 -2.7 -1.4 0.0 -1.4 -5.0 -100.0 -3.8

Missouri -1.5 -2.9 0.0 -1.4 -2.0 0.0 -1.7 -12.5 0.0

Montana -10.8 -10.9 -10.3 -11.4 -10.7 -16.1 -7.4 -14.3 -5.0

Nebraska -23.3 -24.9 -3.1 -17.2 -17.6 -5.3 -36.2 -42.7 -2.2

Nevada 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 n/a 0.0

New Hampshire 3.7 1.7 4.8 2.6 2.2 3.2 4.7 0.0 5.5

New Jersey -0.2 -1.5 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 -0.2 -2.0 0.0

New Mexico 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 n/a 0.0

New York -1.3 -7.2 0.3 -2.5 -7.7 3.0 -0.8 -6.3 -0.3

North Carolina -13.6 -100.0 -13.0 -2.0 -100.0 0.0 -20.5 n/a -20.5

North Dakota -11.1 -12.5 0.0 -11.5 -12.2 0.0 -5.6 -100.0 0.0

Ohio -0.7 -13.0 0.0 -0.5 -4.2 0.0 -0.8 -42.9 0.0

Oklahoma -9.7 -14.0 -0.6 -10.7 -12.8 1.7 -7.8 -19.3 -1.5

Oregon -8.3 -13.0 -3.4 -7.2 -7.2 -7.2 -9.0 -22.9 -3.0

Pennsylvania 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0

Rhode Island -10.0 0.0 -10.3 0.0 0.0 0.0 -10.9 n/a -10.9

South Carolina 3.2 0.0 3.3 3.1 0.0 3.3 3.3 n/a 3.3

South Dakota -6.5 -9.1 2.3 -5.7 -7.2 5.5 -10.8 -75.0 0.0

Tennessee -1.5 0.0 -1.5 0.0 0.0 0.0 -2.2 0.0 -2.2

Texas -1.8 -4.6 0.3 -2.1 -3.0 0.0 -1.5 -13.9 0.4

Utah 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 n/a 0.0

Vermont 1.2 0.0 3.1 0.6 0.7 0.0 2.4 -9.1 4.2

Virginia -1.5 -33.4 0.0 -2.9 -50.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0

Washington -0.4 -0.9 0.0 -0.6 -1.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0

West Virginia 0.0 n/a 0.0 0.0 n/a 0.0 0.0 n/a 0.0

Wisconsin -1.0 -5.2 0.6 -1.3 -4.1 0.7 -0.5 -11.2 0.5

Wyoming -2.0 -6.7 0.0 -3.9 -7.7 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
84

Table A2.5. Number of rural, small, and other school district consolidations, by region and year

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Small Large Total Small Large Total Small Large

United States

1986-87 117 91 26 46 40 6 71 51 20

1987-88 93 73 20 43 40 3 50 33 17

1988-89 105 83 22 62 56 6 43 27 16

1989-90 109 88 21 66 57 9 43 31 12

1990-91 109 87 22 65 58 7 44 29 15

1991-92 189 152 37 138 118 20 51 34 17

1992-93 216 160 56 137 119 18 79 41 38

Northeast

1986-87 13 8 5 5 4 1 8 4 4

1987-88 11 4 7 2 2 0 9 2 7

1988-89 5 4 1 3 2 1 2 2 0

1989-90 3 3 0 1 1 0 2 2 0

1990-91 10 6 4 3 3 0 7 3 4

1991-92 12 6 6 6 5 1 6 1 5

1992-93 13 8 5 6 5 1 7 3 4

Southeast

1986-87 8 2 6 2 2 0 6 0 6

1987-88 2 1 1 0 0 0 2 1 1

1988-89 6 1 5 1 1 0 5 0 5

1989-90 4 1 3 0 0 0 4 1 3

1990-91 4 0 4 0 0 0 4 0 4

1991-92 6 0 6 2 0 2 4 0 4

1992-93 16 5 11 2 1 1 14 4 10

South Central

1986-87 11 11 0 5 5 0 6 6 0

1987-88 4 4 0 2 2 0 2 2 0

1988-89 10 10 0 8 8 0 2 2 0

1989-90 20 20 0 12 12 0 8 8 0

1990-91 28 26 2 18 18 0 10 8 2

1991-92 15 15 0 12 12 0 3 3 0

1992-93 22 21 1 16 16 0 6 5 1

Midwest

1986-87 63 57 6 23 19 4 40 38 2

1987-88 59 55 4 33 31 2 26 24 2

1988-89 60 56 4 37 36 1 23 20 3

1989-90 63 51 12 36 31 5 27 20 7

1990-91 49 44 5 35 32 3 14 12 2

1991-92 123 109 14 93 81 12 30 28 2

1992-93 118 97 21 90 79 11 28 18 10

West

1986-87 22 13 9 11 10 1 11 3 8

1987-88 17 9 8 6 5 1 11 4 7

1988-89 24 12 12 13 9 4 11 3 8

1989-90 19 13 6 17 13 4 2 0 2

1990-91 18 11 7 9 5 4 9 6 3

1991-92 33 22 11 25 20 5 8 2 6

1992-93 47 29 18 23 18 5 24 11 13
85

Table A2.6. Number of rural, small, and other school district consolidations between 1986 and 1993, by state

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Small Large Total Small Large Total Small Large

50 States and D.C. 938 734 204 557 488 69 381 246 135

Alabama 4 1 3 2 0 2 2 1 1

Alaska 2 2 0 2 2 0 0 0 0

Arizona 14 13 1 7 7 0 7 6 1

Arkansas 19 18 1 9 9 0 10 9 1

California 60 13 47 17 6 11 43 7 36

Colorado 3 3 0 3 3 0 0 0 0

Connecticut 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Delaware 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

District o f Columbia 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Florida 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Georgia 5 0 5 0 0 0 5 0 5

Hawaii 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Idaho 5 4 1 5 4 1 0 0 0

Illinois 96 76 20 57 50 7 39 26 13

Indiana 12 7 5 0 0 0 12 7 5

Iowa 51 42 9 48 40 8 3 2 1

Kansas 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Kentucky 2 0 2 0 0 0 2 0 2

Louisiana 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Maine 10 8 2 8 7 1 2 1 1

Maryland 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Massachusetts 19 9 10 6 4 2 13 5 8

Michigan 8 8 0 4 4 0 4 4 0

Minnesota 78 50 28 65 45 20 13 5 8

Mississippi 5 1 4 1 0 1 4 1 3

Missouri 7 7 0 5 5 0 2 2 0

Montana 65 53 12 59 50 9 6 3 3

Nebraska 215 213 2 109 108 1 106 105 1

Nevada 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

New Hampshire 1 1 0 0 0 0 1 1 0

New Jersey 4 2 2 0 0 0 4 2 2

New Mexico 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

New York 20 13 7 9 9 0 11 4 7

North Carolina 19 1 18 1 1 0 18 0 18

North Dakota 36 35 1 35 34 1 1 1 0

Ohio 4 4 0 1 1 0 3 3 0

Oklahoma 70 68 2 52 52 0 18 16 2

Oregon 28 20 8 9 7 2 19 13 6

Pennsylvania 1 1 0 0 0 0 1 1 0

Rhode Island 5 0 5 0 0 0 5 0 5

South Carolina 2 0 2 0 0 0 2 0 2

South Dakota 22 21 1 19 18 1 3 3 0

Tennessee 2 0 2 0 0 0 2 0 2

Texas 21 21 0 12 12 0 9 9 0

Utah 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Vermont 7 5 2 3 2 1 4 3 1

Virginia 7 7 0 3 3 0 4 4 0

Washington 2 1 1 1 1 0 1 0 1

West Virginia 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

Wisconsin 6 6 0 4 4 0 2 2 0

Wyoming 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
86

Table A3.1. Number of schools in rural, small, and other school districts, by level and year

All Districts Rural Districts Nonrural Districts

Tot Elem Unified Sec Tot Elem Unified Sec Tot Elem Unified Sec

All Districts

1986-87 82,397 7,111 74,015 1,271 20,044 2,175 17,586 283 62,353 4,936 56,429 988

1987-88 82,217 7,048 73,955 1,214 19,908 2,154 17,471 283 62,309 4,894 56,484 931

1988-89 82,164 7,008 73,928 1,228 19,795 2,136 17,370 289 62,369 4,872 56,558 939

1989-90 82,398 6,985 74,180 1,233 19,743 2,097 17,353 293 62,655 4,888 56,827 940

1990-91 83,408 7,327 74,780 1,301 19,935 2,248 17,393 294 63,473 5,079 57,387 1,007

1991-92 83,419 7,252 74,855 1,312 19,730 2,170 17,261 299 63,689 5,082 57,594 1,013

1992-93 83,463 7,019 75,113 1,331 19,615 2,081 17,210 324 63,848 4,938 57,903 1,007

1993-94 84,320 6,927 76,010 1,383 19,609 2,004 17,248 357 64,711 4,923 58,762 1,026

Small Districts

 1986-87 9,836 2,299 7,236 301 8,424 1,596 6,602 226 1,412 703 634 75

1987-88 9,573 2,242 7,046 285 8,290 1,578 6,489 223 1,283 664 557 62

1988-89 9,478 2,221 6,971 286 8,205 1,553 6,427 225 1,273 668 544 61

1989-90 9,385 2,173 6,926 286 8,153 1,518 6,410 225 1,232 655 516 61

1990-91 9,496 2,262 6,945 289 8,268 1,615 6,427 226 1,228 647 518 63

1991-92 9,317 2,175 6,848 294 8,110 1,550 6,331 229 1,207 625 517 65

1992-93 9,195 2,090 6,783 322 8,012 1,494 6,263 255 1,183 596 520 67

1993-94 9,074 2,000 6,718 356 7,917 1,435 6,195 287 1,157 565 523 69

Large Districts

1986-87 72,561 4,812 66,779 970 11,620 579 10,984 57 60,941 4,233 55,795 913

1987-88 72,644 4,806 66,909 929 11,618 576 10,982 60 61,026 4,230 55,927 869

1988-89 72,686 4,787 66,957 942 11,590 583 10,943 64 61,096 4,204 56,014 878

1989-90 73,013 4,812 67,254 947 11,590 579 10,943 68 61,423 4,233 56,311 879

1990-91 73,912 5,065 67,835 1,012 11,667 633 10,966 68 62,245 4,432 56,869 944

1991-92 74,102 5,077 68,007 1,018 11,620 620 10,930 70 62,482 4,457 57,077 948

1992-93 74,268 4,929 68,330 1,009 11,603 587 10,947 69 62,665 4,342 57,383 940

1993-94 75,246 4,927 69,292 1,027 11,692 569 11,053 70 63,554 4,358 58,239 957
87

Table A3.2. Number of small schools in rural, small, and other school districts, by level and year

All Districts Rural Districts Nonrural Districts

Tot Elem Unified Sec Tot Elem Unified Sec Tot Elem Unified Sec

All Districts

1986-87 15,651 2,478 12,732 441 9,844 1,665 7,942 237 5,807 813 4,790 204

1987-88 15,233 2,350 12,479 404 9,605 1,598 7,773 234 5,628 752 4,706 170

1988-89 15,132 2,281 12,429 422 9,468 1,569 7,661 238 5,664 712 4,768 184

1989-90 15,146 2,213 12,503 430 9,463 1,532 7,688 243 5,683 681 4,815 187

1990-91 15,353 2,263 12,639 451 9,511 1,600 7,662 249 5,842 663 4,977 202

1991-92 15,186 2,183 12,535 468 9,313 1,554 7,511 248 5,873 629 5,024 220

1992-93 14,943 2,074 12,380 489 9,059 1,489 7,312 258 5,884 585 5,068 231

1993-94 14,959 1,968 12,488 503 8,903 1,423 7,199 281 6,056 545 5,289 222

Small Districts

1986-87 7,866 2,252 5,336 278 6,690 1,570 4,896 224 1,176 682 440 54

1987-88 7,659 2,206 5,186 267 6,567 1,550 4,797 220 1,092 656 389 47

1988-89 7,479 2,132 5,084 263 6,449 1,513 4,715 221 1,030 619 369 42

1989-90 7,375 2,054 5,057 264 6,388 1,468 4,700 220 987 586 357 44

1990-91 7,375 2,081 5,028 266 6,425 1,517 4,687 221 950 564 341 45

1991-92 7,174 2,006 4,904 264 6,270 1,478 4,573 219 904 528 331 45

1992-93 7,019 1,917 4,823 279 6,140 1,418 4,490 232 879 499 333 47

1993-94 6,873 1,814 4,758 301 6,030 1,354 4,420 256 843 460 338 45

Large Districts

1986-87 7,785 226 7,396 163 3,154 95 3,046 13 4,631 131 4,350 150

1987-88 7,574 144 7,293 137 3,038 48 2,976 14 4,536 96 4,317 123

1988-89 7,653 149 7,345 159 3,019 56 2,946 17 4,634 93 4,399 142

1989-90 7,771 159 7,446 166 3,075 64 2,988 23 4,696 95 4,458 143

1990-91 7,978 182 7,611 185 3,086 83 2,975 28 4,892 99 4,636 157

1991-92 8,012 177 7,631 204 3,043 76 2,938 29 4,969 101 4,693 175

1992-93 7,924 157 7,557 210 2,919 71 2,822 26 5,005 86 4,735 184

1993-94 8,086 154 7,730 202 2,873 69 2,779 25 5,213 85 4,951 177
88

Table A3.3. Number of small rural schools in rural, small, and other school districts, by level and year

All Districts Rural Districts Nonrural Districts

Tot Elem Unified Sec Tot Elem Unified Sec Tot Elem Unified Sec

All Districts

1986-87 9,880 1,706 7,929 245 8,914 1,637 7,043 234 966 69 886 11

1987-88 9,611 1,631 7,738 242 8,673 1,570 6,872 231 938 61 866 11

1988-89 9,479 1,599 7,633 247 8,554 1,544 6,775 235 925 55 858 12

1989-90 9,506 1,566 7,688 252 8,567 1,513 6,813 241 939 53 875 11

1990-91 9,555 1,635 7,657 263 8,614 1,587 6,779 248 941 48 878 15

1991-92 9,959 1,559 8,138 262 9,076 1,547 7,284 245 883 12 854 17

1992-93 9,708 1,493 7,943 272 8,832 1,481 7,096 255 876 12 847 17

1993-94 9,501 1,424 7,784 293 8,631 1,413 6,940 278 870 11 844 15

Small Districts

1986-87 6,381 1,596 4,560 225 6,256 1,543 4,492 221 125 53 68 4

1987-88 6,248 1,576 4,451 221 6,126 1,524 4,385 217 122 52 66 4

1988-89 6,131 1,537 4,374 220 6,024 1,490 4,316 218 107 47 58 2

1989-90 6,063 1,493 4,350 220 5,973 1,450 4,305 218 90 43 45 2

1990-91 6,081 1,541 4,319 221 6,019 1,506 4,293 220 62 35 26 1

1991-92 6,252 1,474 4,561 217 6,233 1,472 4,545 216 19 2 16 1

1992-93 6,118 1,412 4,476 230 6,097 1,410 4,458 229 21 2 18 1

1993-94 5,965 1,346 4,365 254 5,946 1,344 4,349 253 19 2 16 1

Large Districts

1986-87 3,499 110 3,369 20 2,658 94 2,551 13 841 16 818 7

1987-88 3,363 55 3,287 21 2,547 46 2,487 14 816 9 800 7

1988-89 3,348 62 3,259 27 2,530 54 2,459 17 818 8 800 10

1989-90 3,443 73 3,338 32 2,594 63 2,508 23 849 10 830 9

1990-91 3,474 94 3,338 42 2,595 81 2,486 28 879 13 852 14

1991-92 3,707 85 3,577 45 2,843 75 2,739 29 864 10 838 16

1992-93 3,590 81 3,467 42 2,735 71 2,638 26 855 10 829 16

1993-94 3,536 78 3,419 39 2,685 69 2,591 25 851 9 828 14
89

Table A3.4. Number of regular and non-regular schools in rural, small, and other school districts, by year

Schools in Schools in Schools in

All Districts Rural Districts Nonrural Districts

Regular Nonregular Regular Nonregular Regular Nonregular

All Districts

1986-87 79,043 3,052 19,664 321 59,379 2,731

1987-88 78,610 2,999 19,414 309 59,196 2,690

1988-89 78,753 2,789 19,314 281 59,439 2,508

1989-90 78,968 3,192 19,401 297 59,567 2,895

1990-91 79,983 3,213 19,558 341 60,425 2,872

1991-92 79,647 3,791 19,352 386 60,295 3,405

1992-93 79,362 4,101 19,128 487 60,234 3,614

1993-94 79,757 4,565 19,146 465 60,611 4,100

Small Districts

1986-87 9,606 180 8,307 77 1,299 103

1987-88 9,386 125 8,166 66 1,220 59

1988-89 9,315 101 8,104 55 1,211 46

1989-90 9,261 110 8,088 56 1,173 54

1990-91 9,329 165 8,165 103 1,164 62

1991-92 9,124 200 8,022 94 1,102 106

1992-93 8,933 262 7,858 154 1,075 108

1993-94 8,850 224 7,807 110 1,043 114

Large Districts

1986-87 69,437 2,872 11,357 244 58,080 2,628

1987-88 69,224 2,874 11,248 243 57,976 2,631

1988-89 69,438 2,688 11,210 226 58,228 2,462

1989-90 69,707 3,082 11,313 241 58,394 2,841

1990-91 70,654 3,048 11,393 238 59,261 2,810

1991-92 70,523 3,591 11,330 292 59,193 3,299

1992-93 70,429 3,839 11,270 333 59,159 3,506

1993-94 70,907 4,341 11,339 355 59,568 3,986
90

Table A3.5. Number of combined (K-12), elementary, intermediate, secondary, and ungraded/other schools

in rural, small, and other school districts in 1986-87 and 1993-94

All Districts Rural Districts Nonrural Districts

Total Small Large Total Small Large Total Small Large

Elementary Schools

1986-87 50,591 5,563 45,028 11,225 4,621 6,604 39,366 942 38,424

1993-94 51,513 4,823 46,690 10,503 4,077 6,426 41,010 746 40,264

Intermediate Schools

1986-87 11,938 525 11,413 2,064 480 1,584 9,874 45 9,829

1993-94 12,954 821 12,133 2,560 763 1,797 10,394 58 10,336

High Schools

1986-87 15,714 3,180 12,534 5,664 2,883 2,781 10,050 297 9,753

1993-94 15,826 2,750 13,076 5,315 2,521 2,794 10,511 229 10,282

Combined Schools

1986-87 1,775 409 1,366 805 355 450 970 54 916

1993-94 2,461 586 1,875 1,002 507 495 1,459 79 1,380

Ungraded Schools

1986-87 966 63 903 55 11 44 911 52 859

1993-94 608 45 563 33 11 22 575 34 541
91

Table A3.6. Number of schools with kindergarten and ungraded classes in rural, small, and other school

districts, by year

Schools in Schools in Schools in

All Districts Rural Districts Nonrural Districts

Kinder- Prekin- Kinder- Prekin- Kinder- Prekingarten dergarten Ungraded garten dergarten Ungraded garten dergarten Ungraded

All Districts

1986-87 44,791 5,539 25,435 10,282 953 4,238 34,509 4,586 21,197

1987-88 46,364 6,467 23,434 10,463 1,197 3,812 35,901 5,270 19,622

1988-89 46,525 6,885 25,140 10,453 1,248 4,123 36,072 5,637 21,017

1989-90 46,803 8,178 25,919 10,497 1,490 4,018 36,306 6,688 21,901

1990-91 46,963 9,416 23,908 10,465 1,828 3,569 36,498 7,588 20,339

1991-92 46,940 11,591 24,000 10,330 2,417 3,670 36,610 9,174 20,330

1992-93 47,092 12,358 23,908 10,237 2,502 3,679 36,855 9,856 20,229

1993-94 47,126 13,316 22,713 10,162 2,731 3,266 36,964 10,585 19,447

Small Districts

1986-87 5,116 495 1,283 4,278 450 1,087 838 45 196

1987-88 5,199 637 1,240 4,362 562 1,078 837 75 162

1988-89 5,214 626 1,273 4,373 568 1,085 841 58 188

1989-90 5,207 719 1,081 4,378 655 923 829 64 158

1990-91 5,159 893 1,004 4,349 812 845 810 81 159

1991-92 5,070 1,001 1,008 4,286 902 852 784 99 156

1992-93 4,982 1,084 1,000 4,213 984 838 769 100 162

1993-94 4,895 1,181 851 4,162 1,066 685 733 115 166

Large Districts

1986-87 39,675 5,044 24,152 6,004 503 3,151 33,671 4,541 21,001

1987-88 41,165 5,830 22,194 6,101 635 2,734 35,064 5,195 19,460

1988-89 41,311 6,259 23,867 6,080 680 3,038 35,231 5,579 20,829

1989-90 41,596 7,459 24,838 6,119 835 3,095 35,477 6,624 21,743

1990-91 41,804 8,523 22,904 6,116 1,016 2,724 35,688 7,507 20,180

1991-92 41,870 10,590 22,992 6,044 1,515 2,818 35,826 9,075 20,174

1992-93 42,110 11,274 22,908 6,024 1,518 2,841 36,086 9,756 20,067

1993-94 42,231 12,135 21,862 6,000 1,665 2,581 36,231 10,470 19,281
92

Table A3.7. Number of small schools with fewer than one teacher per grade, by level

All Districts Rural Districts Nonrural Districts

Tot Elem Unified Sec Tot Elem Unified Sec Tot Elem Unified Sec

All Districts

1986-87 4,356 1,705 2,580 71 2,691 1,190 1,487 14 1,665 515 1,093 57

1987-88 4,093 1,656 2,390 47 2,573 1,176 1,382 15 1,520 480 1,008 32

1988-89 4,415 1,640 2,701 74 2,725 1,173 1,531 21 1,690 467 1,170 53

1989-90 4,201 1,563 2,574 64 2,598 1,120 1,459 19 1,603 443 1,115 45

1990-91 4,225 1,545 2,603 77 2,595 1,118 1,455 22 1,630 427 1,148 55

1991-92 4,229 1,490 2,643 96 2,482 1,071 1,380 31 1,747 419 1,263 65

1992-93 4,032 1,368 2,566 98 2,274 991 1,252 31 1,758 377 1,314 67

1993-94 4,152 1,294 2,736 122 2,263 945 1,267 51 1,889 349 1,469 71

Small Districts

1986-87 2,599 1,646 934 19 2,016 1,164 845 7 583 482 89 12

1987-88 2,491 1,604 874 13 1,970 1,155 808 7 521 449 66 6

1988-89 2,588 1,583 986 19 2,076 1,146 917 13 512 437 69 6

1989-90 2,428 1,501 911 16 1,949 1,089 851 9 479 412 60 7

1990-91 2,418 1,483 916 19 1,961 1,090 861 10 457 393 55 9

1991-92 2,340 1,428 885 27 1,885 1,046 822 17 455 382 63 10

1992-93 2,110 1,306 776 28 1,705 966 722 17 405 340 54 11

 1993-94 2,056 1,227 784 45 1,677 919 722 36 379 308 62 9

Large Districts

1986-87 1,757 59 1,646 52 675 26 642 7 1,082 33 1,004 45

1987-88 1,602 52 1,516 34 603 21 574 8 999 31 942 26

1988-89 1,827 57 1,715 55 649 27 614 8 1,178 30 1,101 47

1989-90 1,773 62 1,663 48 649 31 608 10 1,124 31 1,055 38

1990-91 1,807 62 1,687 58 634 28 594 12 1,173 34 1,093 46

1991-92 1,889 62 1,758 69 597 25 558 14 1,292 37 1,200 55

1992-93 1,922 62 1,790 70 569 25 530 14 1,353 37 1,260 56

1993-94 2,096 67 1,952 77 586 26 545 15 1,510 41 1,407 62
93

Table A3.8. Patterns of school levels in small rural districts, by year

E M H C U 86-87 87-88 88-89 89-90 90-91 91-92 92-93 93-94

1 1 1,997 1,877 1,824 1,758 1,670 1,646 1,584 1,520

1 1,435 1,421 1,417 1,403 1,275 1,280 1,229 1,185

1 1 1 359 368 376 399 437 416 433 462

1 176 269 289 304 305 299 301 299

1 207 208 206 210 205 202 190 164

1 1 15 14 31 47 161 160 155 128

2 1 136 130 126 131 121 118 109 105

2 1 1 62 63 60 59 62 70 78 83

1 1 65 52 53 52 56 71 77 76

3 1 1 14 18 18 18 18 16 19 24

1 7 9 9 14 14 18 17 19

1 2 4 5 2 5 10 11 13 19

2 31 34 29 28 32 23 23 19

2 2 10 11 11 13 12 13 17 17

1 44 54 43 16 15 16 10 13

21 2 3 3 2 6 7 9 9

2 43446557

1 11 4 4 7 3 4 9 8 7

2 1 1 1 2 2 6 6 7 5

1 43122524

2 12311214

11 2 2 2 3 2 4 3 3 4

41 1 2 2 2 3 3 2 3 4

11 0 3 3 3 5 3 5 3

11 1 1 3 3 3 4 2 3

11 1 0 0 1 0 0 1 2 3

22 1 0 0 0 0 1 2 1 3

3 33433443

3 1 19 15 15 10 10 10 7 3

1 1 1 02332022

11 1 1 3 3 3 3 2 3 2 2

3 2 22211232

4 1 65444432

31 0 0 0 1 3 0 0 1

1 1 1 1 2 1 10 0 1 0

2 9 11230010

61 1 2 2 3 3 3 0 0 0

Other 33 35 29 32 33 26 25 34

Note: “E”, “M”, “H”, “C”, and “U” refers to the grade span of school. They stand for elementary, intermediate, high, combined,

and undefined or ungraded, respectively.
94

Table A3.9. Counts of year-to-year school level changes in small rural districts

Year 1 to Year 2

 E M H C U TO E M H C U 86-87 87-88 88-89 89-90 90-91 91-92 92-93 Total

1 Ú 0 21 19 28 34 29 46 43 220

1 1 Ú 1 1 1 22 20 41 46 13 24 19 185

1 1 Ú 1 86 18 25 9 5 6 3 152

1 Ú 1 1 1 2 2 96 1 2 1 105

1 1 Ú 0 0 8 6 9 9 14 28 29 103

1 1 Ú 1 1 12 11 9 16 23 17 15 103

1 1 1 Ú 1 1 6 10 9 9 36 13 9 92

1 1 Ú 1 10 8 11 18 13 7 7 74

1 1 Ú 1 1 2 8 14 16 5 10 4 59

 11 Ú 1 1 7 4 7 10 7 9 10 54

1 Ú 1 6 6 8 8 6 7 8 49

11 Ú 0 0 0 0 3 0 1 14 30 48

 1 Ú 1 1 4 3 17 3 8 5 1 41

2 1 Ú 1 1 6 5 5 7 6 5 2 36

 1 Ú 1 5 8 9 2 4 0 2 30

1 1 Ú 1 17 4 1 1 1 3 1 28

 1 Ú 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 10 17 27

 21 1 Ú 1 1 1 1 2 2 4 9 3 6 27

 2 Ú 1 1 2 4 3 11 1 4 26

 1 Ú 1 4 4 3 6 3 2 1 23

1 1 1 Ú 0 0 0 1 2 4 3 3 7 3 23

1 Ú 2 2 3 0 10 2 4 1 22

1 Ú 1 2 2 4 3 3 6 1 21

2 1 Ú 1 1 1 3 3 0 3 2 6 4 21

1 Ú 1 0 3 2 5 5 3 2 20

 1 Ú 0 1 3 2 0 4 5 4 19

 1 Ú 0 6 0 3 2 4 1 2 18

1 Ú 0 6 0 0 3 3 . 6 18

1 1 Ú 1 1 1 3 4 0 4 1 3 2 17

1 1 Ú 2 1 3 1 0 3 5 4 1 17

 1 Ú 0 2 1 1 6 2 2 2 16

1 Ú 0 0 3 1 2 1 5 4 16

1 1 Ú 1 2 2 0 0 5 1 4 3 15

111 Ú 2 1 1 0 1 1 1 2 5 5 15

1 1 1 Ú 2 1 3 0 3 2 2 2 2 14

 0 Ú 1 5 1 0 0 3 4 0 13

111 Ú 1 10 0 1 1 0 1 0 13

2 1 Ú 2 1 1 3 0 0 4 3 2 1 13

 1 Ú 1 1 1 0 7 0 0 0 4 12

 1 Ú 1 3 1 2 2 1 2 1 12

 11 Ú 1 2 2 0 2 3 1 2 12

 11 1 Ú 1 1 0 4 2 3 1 1 1 12

 00 Ú 1 1 1 1 2 3 2 2 0 11

 00 0 Ú 2 1 1 0 1 3 4 1 0 2 11

 1 Ú 1 0 3 1 1 0 2 4 11

 11 Ú 1 1 5 3 0 0 0 2 11

1 Ú 1 1 2 0 1 2 0 2 3 10

1 1 Ú 1 0 0 0 0 10 0 0 10

Note: Only pattern changes with 10 or more occurrences are included in this table. “E”, “M”, “H”, “C”, and “U” refers to the

grade span of school. They stand for elementary, intermediate, high, combined, and undefined or ungraded, respectively.
95

Table A3.10. Counts of year-to-year school level changes in small rural districts with increasing or declining

enrollment

Year 1 to Year 2 86-87 87-88 88-89 89-90 90-91 91-92

E M H C U TO E M H C U to 87-88 to 88-89 to 89-90 to 90-91 to 91-92 to 92-93 Total 

Decreased Enrollment

1 Ú 0 41 47 62 62 73 88 373

1 1 Ú 0 0 14 16 19 26 44 57 176

1 1 Ú 1 1 1 13 22 32 12 3 8 90

1 1 Ú 1 14 6 20 23 15 9 87

1 1 Ú 0 0 0 0 3 1 16 42 62

1 1 Ú 1 33 8 5 5 4 3 58

111 Ú 1 1 11 9 4 11 14 3 52

111 Ú 0 0 0 3 7 7 6 12 9 44

1 Ú 1 1 0 0 20 17 2 0 39

1 1 Ú 1 1 2 7 11 8 6 2 36

1 1 Ú 1 1 4 3 6 7 7 4 31

1 Ú 0 3 2 7 8 4 4 28

1 Ú 0 7 2 5 4 6 3 27

1 Ú 0 2 4 2 3 6 9 26

1 Ú 0 2 6 2 1 4 9 24

1 1 Ú 1 1 2 4 10 2 1 3 22

1 1 Ú 1 5 8 3 0 1 2 19

2 1 Ú 1 1 5 4 1 1 5 2 18

1 Ú 1 1 0 7 5 2 1 2 17

2 1 Ú 0 0 2 4 2 1 3 4 16

2 Ú 0 1 4 1 0 3 4 13

1 1 Ú 1 9 0 1 0 0 2 12

1 Ú 1 1 1 3 2 3 1 11

211 Ú 1 1 1 1 1 3 3 1 2 11

Increased Enrollment

1 1 Ú 1 1 1 18 15 26 17 25 26 127

1 1 Ú 1 35 14 9 4 5 2 69

1 1 Ú 1 1 7 3 8 13 18 12 61

1 1 Ú 1 1 7 12 15 11 6 8 59

1 Ú 1 1 2 2 21 27 0 0 52

111 Ú 1 1 2 4 5 10 15 13 49

1 Ú 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 10 28 38

1 Ú 1 1 2 4 7 6 11 5 35

0 0 Ú 1 1 3 3 5 6 4 6 27

1 1 Ú 1 1 1 2 3 5 9 4 24

1 1 Ú 1 3 7 5 4 3 2 24

111 Ú 2 1 1 1 2 2 3 6 6 20

2 1 Ú 1 1 2 4 6 0 6 2 20

000 Ú 2 1 1 1 4 7 3 2 2 19

1 1 Ú 2 1 1 1 2 7 5 3 19

2 1 Ú 1 1 1 1 2 1 2 3 6 15

1 Ú 2 4 2 4 1 1 2 14

1 1 Ú 2 1 1 0 1 1 2 4 6 14

211 Ú 1 1 1 0 1 2 4 4 3 14

1 Ú 1 1 4 5 2 1 0 13

0 Ú 1 2 1 0 3 6 0 12

0 Ú 1 0 1 3 4 3 1 12

1 Ú 1 0 1 3 2 3 2 11

111 Ú 2 1 1 1 3 1 4 1 11

0 Ú 1 6 0 0 0 1 3 10

000 Ú 1 1 1 0 1 3 5 0 1 10

Note: Only pattern changes with 10 or more occurrences are included in this table. “E”, “M”, “H”, “C”, and “U” refers to the

grade span of school. They stand for elementary, intermediate, high, combined, and undefined or ungraded, respectively.
96

TableA 4.1a. Number of minority and white students in rural, small, and other school districts, by year

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Minority White Total Minority White Total Minority White

Total

1987-88 39,749,428 12,119,382 27,630,046 5,397,036 822,860 4,574,176 34,352,392 11,296,522 23,055,870

1988-89 39,941,106 12,350,689 27,590,417 5,409,189 838,609 4,570,580 34,531,917 11,512,080 23,019,837

1989-90 40,310,954 12,656,093 27,654,861 5,422,985 827,202 4,595,783 34,887,969 11,828,891 23,059,078

1990-91 40,970,006 13,116,179 27,853,827 5,452,961 831,148 4,621,813 35,517,045 12,285,031 23,232,014

1991-92 41,812,543 13,600,023 28,212,520 5,534,517 852,957 4,681,560 36,278,026 12,747,066 23,530,960

1992-93 42,572,064 13,817,862 28,754,202 5,628,550 876,480 4,752,070 36,943,514 12,941,382 24,002,132

1993-94 43,197,078 14,642,689 28,554,389 5,710,536 916,301 4,794,235 37,486,542 13,726,388 23,760,154

Small

1987-88 1,274,970 153,561 1,121,409 1,112,648 128,054 984,594 162,322 25,507 136,815

1988-89 1,292,108 163,218 1,128,890 1,109,220 130,370 978,850 182,888 32,848 150,040

1989-90 1,293,286 160,360 1,132,926 1,108,818 124,400 984,418 184,468 35,960 148,508

1990-91 1,293,245 158,388 1,134,857 1,107,152 121,749 985,403 186,093 36,639 149,454

1991-92 1,308,893 163,715 1,145,178 1,119,153 125,675 993,478 189,740 38,040 151,700

1992-93 1,325,246 167,201 1,158,045 1,130,763 128,429 1,002,334 194,483 38,772 155,711

1993-94 1,327,372 177,122 1,150,250 1,131,346 135,070 996,276 196,026 42,052 153,974

Large

1987-88 38,474,458 11,965,821 26,508,637 4,284,388 694,806 3,589,582 34,190,070 11,271,015 22,919,055

1988-89 38,648,998 12,187,471 26,461,527 4,299,969 708,239 3,591,730 34,349,029 11,479,232 22,869,797

1989-90 39,017,668 12,495,733 26,521,935 4,314,167 702,802 3,611,365 34,703,501 11,792,931 22,910,570

1990-91 39,676,761 12,957,791 26,718,970 4,345,809 709,399 3,636,410 35,330,952 12,248,392 23,082,560

1991-92 40,503,650 13,436,308 27,067,342 4,415,364 727,282 3,688,082 36,088,286 12,709,026 23,379,260

1992-93 41,246,818 13,650,661 27,596,157 4,497,787 748,051 3,749,736 36,749,031 12,902,610 23,846,421

1993-94 41,869,706 14,465,567 27,404,139 4,579,190 781,231 3,797,959 37,290,516 13,684,336 23,606,180
97

Table A4.1b. Percentage of minority and white students in rural, small, and other school districts, by year

Total Rural Nonrural

Minority White Minority White Minority White

Total

1987-88 30.5 69.5 15.2 84.8 32.9 67.1

1988-89 30.9 69.1 15.5 84.5 33.3 66.7

1989-90 31.4 68.6 15.3 84.7 33.9 66.1

1990-91 32.0 68.0 15.2 84.8 34.6 65.4

1991-92 32.5 67.5 15.4 84.6 35.1 64.9

1992-93 32.5 67.5 15.6 84.4 35.0 65.0

1993-94 33.9 66.1 16.0 84.0 36.6 63.4

Small

1987-88 12.0 88.0 11.5 88.5 15.7 84.3

1988-89 12.6 87.4 11.8 88.2 18.0 82.0

1989-90 12.4 87.6 11.2 88.8 19.5 80.5

1990-91 12.2 87.8 11.0 89.0 19.7 80.3

1991-92 12.5 87.5 11.2 88.8 20.0 80.0

1992-93 12.6 87.4 11.4 88.6 19.9 80.1

1993-94 13.3 86.7 11.9 88.1 21.5 78.5

Large

1987-88 31.1 68.9 16.2 83.8 33.0 67.0

1988-89 31.5 68.5 16.5 83.5 33.4 66.6

1989-90 32.0 68.0 16.3 83.7 34.0 66.0

1990-91 32.7 67.3 16.3 83.7 34.7 65.3

1991-92 33.2 66.8 16.5 83.5 35.2 64.8

1992-93 33.1 66.9 16.6 83.4 35.1 64.9

1993-94 34.5 65.5 17.1 82.9 36.7 63.3
98

Table A4.1c. Number of black, Hispanic, Asian, and Native American students (in thousands) in rural,

small, and other school districts, by year

Total Rural Nonrural

Native Native Native

Black Hisp. Asian Amer. Black Hisp. Asian Amer. Black Hisp. Asian Amer.

Total 

1987-88 6,527 4,012 1,204 377 481 191 26 125 6,046 3,821 1,178 252

1988-89 6,498 4,229 1,242 383 488 202 24 125 6,010 4,027 1,217 258

1989-90 6,525 4,445 1,295 391 473 205 24 125 6,052 4,240 1,272 266

1990-91 6,644 4,731 1,343 398 466 214 23 128 6,178 4,517 1,320 271

1991-92 6,769 4,990 1,417 424 467 227 24 135 6,303 4,763 1,392 289

1992-93 6,856 5,085 1,443 433 474 239 25 138 6,383 4,846 1,418 294

1993-94 7,169 5,470 1,547 457 490 255 27 144 6,679 5,215 1,519 313

Small

1987-88 40 60 7 46 32 50 6 41 9 11 2 5

1988-89 41 68 7 47 33 51 5 42 9 17 2 5

1989-90 35 72 7 46 27 52 4 41 8 20 3 5

1990-91 31 73 6 47 23 52 4 42 8 21 2 5

1991-92 31 76 7 49 23 55 4 44 8 22 3 5

1992-93 31 78 7 51 23 56 4 45 8 22 3 6

1993-94 32 84 7 54 23 60 4 48 9 24 3 6

Large

1987-88 6,487 3,952 1,197 331 449 142 20 84 6,037 3,810 1,177 247

1988-89 6,456 4,161 1,234 336 455 150 20 83 6,001 4,011 1,215 253

1989-90 6,490 4,373 1,289 345 446 153 19 84 6,043 4,220 1,269 261

1990-91 6,613 4,658 1,336 351 443 162 19 85 6,170 4,496 1,317 266

1991-92 6,738 4,914 1,410 374 443 173 20 91 6,295 4,741 1,390 283

1992-93 6,825 5,007 1,436 382 450 184 21 93 6,375 4,824 1,415 289

1993-94 7,137 5,386 1,539 403 467 195 23 96 6,670 5,191 1,517 307
99

Table A4.1d. Percentage of black, Hispanic, Asian, and Native American students in rural, small, and other

school districts, by year

Total Rural Nonrural

Native Native Native

Black Hisp. Asian Amer. Black Hisp. Asian Amer. Black Hisp. Asian Amer.

Total

1987-88 16.4 10.1 3.0 0.9 8.9 3.5 0.5 2.3 17.6 11.1 3.4 0.7

1988-89 16.3 10.6 3.1 1.0 9.0 3.7 0.5 2.3 17.4 11.7 3.5 0.7

1989-90 16.2 11.0 3.2 1.0 8.7 3.8 0.4 2.3 17.3 12.2 3.6 0.8

1990-91 16.2 11.5 3.3 1.0 8.6 3.9 0.4 2.3 17.4 12.7 3.7 0.8

1991-92 16.2 11.9 3.4 1.0 8.4 4.1 0.4 2.4 17.4 13.1 3.8 0.8

1992-93 16.1 11.9 3.4 1.0 8.4 4.3 0.4 2.5 17.3 13.1 3.8 0.8

1993-94 16.6 12.7 3.6 1.1 8.6 4.5 0.5 2.5 17.8 13.9 4.1 0.8

Small

1987-88 3.2 4.7 0.6 3.6 2.8 4.5 0.5 3.7 5.3 6.6 1.0 2.9

1988-89 3.2 5.3 0.6 3.6 2.9 4.6 0.4 3.8 4.8 9.1 1.4 2.7

1989-90 2.7 5.6 0.5 3.6 2.4 4.7 0.4 3.7 4.6 10.8 1.4 2.7

1990-91 2.4 5.7 0.5 3.7 2.1 4.7 0.3 3.8 4.3 11.3 1.3 2.8

1991-92 2.4 5.8 0.5 3.8 2.1 4.9 0.4 3.9 4.2 11.5 1.4 2.9

1992-93 2.4 5.9 0.5 3.8 2.1 4.9 0.4 4.0 4.2 11.4 1.4 3.0

1993-94 2.4 6.3 0.5 4.1 2.0 5.3 0.4 4.2 4.5 12.4 1.5 3.1

Large

1987-88 16.9 10.3 3.1 0.9 10.5 3.3 0.5 2.0 17.7 11.1 3.4 0.7

1988-89 16.7 10.8 3.2 0.9 10.6 3.5 0.5 1.9 17.5 11.7 3.5 0.7

1989-90 16.6 11.2 3.3 0.9 10.3 3.6 0.5 1.9 17.4 12.2 3.7 0.8

1990-91 16.7 11.7 3.4 0.9 10.2 3.7 0.4 2.0 17.5 12.7 3.7 0.8

1991-92 16.6 12.1 3.5 0.9 10.0 3.9 0.5 2.1 17.4 13.1 3.9 0.8

1992-93 16.5 12.1 3.5 0.9 10.0 4.1 0.5 2.1 17.3 13.1 3.9 0.8

1993-94 17.0 12.9 3.7 1.0 10.2 4.3 0.5 2.1 17.9 13.9 4.1 0.8
100

Table A4.1e. Number of low, medium, or high minority rural, small, and other districts, by year

Total Rural Nonrural

Minority Minority Minority

Low Medium High Low Medium High Low Medium High

Total

1987-88 9,879 4,039 1,355 5,408 1,467 512 4,471 2,572 843

1988-89 9,760 4,074 1,365 5,371 1,477 505 4,389 2,597 860

1989-90 9,732 3,980 1,401 5,394 1,391 520 4,338 2,589 881

1990-91 9,610 3,996 1,429 5,326 1,410 524 4,284 2,586 905

1991-92 9,387 4,126 1,443 5,212 1,467 528 4,175 2,659 915

1992-93 9,290 4,093 1,437 5,131 1,434 526 4,159 2,659 911

1993-94 8,984 4,119 1,545 4,984 1,445 550 4,000 2,674 995

Small

1987-88 4,134 1,128 346 3,485 874 267 649 254 79

1988-89 4,090 1,111 342 3,469 863 261 621 248 81

1989-90 4,078 1,038 353 3,472 803 271 606 235 82

1990-91 3,996 1,052 354 3,415 816 274 581 236 80

1991-92 3,891 1,093 349 3,330 851 276 561 242 73

1992-93 3,798 1,062 344 3,255 823 273 543 239 71

1993-94 3,618 1,070 364 3,117 835 286 501 235 78

Large

1987-88 5,745 2,911 1,009 1,923 593 245 3,822 2,318 764

1988-89 5,670 2,963 1,023 1,902 614 244 3,768 2,349 779

1989-90 5,654 2,942 1,048 1,922 588 249 3,732 2,354 799

1990-91 5,614 2,944 1,075 1,911 594 250 3,703 2,350 825

1991-92 5,496 3,033 1,094 1,882 616 252 3,614 2,417 842

1992-93 5,492 3,031 1,093 1,876 611 253 3,616 2,420 840

1993-94 5,366 3,049 1,181 1,867 610 264 3,499 2,439 917
101

Table A4.1f. Minority enrollment in low, medium, or high minority rural, small, and other school

districts, by year

Total Rural Nonrural

Minority Minority Minority

Low Medium High Low Medium High Low Medium High

Total

1987-88 4.8 33.6 61.6 12.8 42.9 44.3 4.2 32.9 62.8

1988-89 4.8 33.6 61.6 12.9 43.8 43.2 4.2 32.9 62.9

1989-90 4.5 33.7 61.7 12.6 43.2 44.2 4.0 33.1 62.9

1990-91 4.2 33.3 62.5 11.2 43.8 45.0 3.7 32.6 63.6

1991-92 4.0 33.6 62.4 10.5 45.0 44.5 3.6 32.9 63.6

1992-93 4.0 33.9 62.1 10.4 45.0 44.7 3.6 33.1 63.3

1993-94 3.6 32.6 63.7 10.3 43.3 46.4 3.2 31.9 64.9

Small

1987-88 16.8 43.6 39.6 17.4 43.3 39.2 13.4 45.2 41.4

1988-89 16.6 43.6 39.9 17.9 44.6 37.5 11.0 39.7 49.3

1989-90 16.0 41.1 42.9 17.7 42.4 39.9 9.9 36.6 53.5

1990-91 12.6 42.2 45.3 13.9 44.0 42.1 8.2 36.1 55.7

1991-92 12.1 43.7 44.2 13.4 45.3 41.2 7.7 38.4 53.9

1992-93 12.0 44.1 43.9 13.3 45.7 41.0 7.8 38.6 53.6

1993-94 12.2 43.3 44.6 13.6 45.0 41.4 7.5 37.9 54.6

Large

1987-88 4.7 33.5 61.9 12.0 42.8 45.2 4.2 32.9 62.9

1988-89 4.6 33.5 61.9 12.0 43.7 44.3 4.2 32.9 63.0

1989-90 4.4 33.6 62.0 11.6 43.4 45.0 4.0 33.1 63.0

1990-91 4.1 33.2 62.7 10.7 43.8 45.5 3.7 32.6 63.7

1991-92 3.9 33.5 62.6 10.0 44.9 45.1 3.5 32.8 63.6

1992-93 3.9 33.8 62.4 9.9 44.8 45.3 3.5 33.1 63.3

1993-94 3.5 32.5 64.0 9.7 43.0 47.3 3.2 31.9 64.9
102

Table A4.1g. Percent minority enrollment by region in rural, small, and other school districts, by year

Total Rural Nonrural

 Total Small Large Total Small Large Total Small Large

United States

1987-88 30.5 12.0 31.1 15.2 11.5 16.2 32.9 15.7 33.0

1988-89 30.9 12.6 31.5 15.5 11.8 16.5 33.3 18.0 33.4

1989-90 31.4 12.4 32.0 15.3 11.2 16.3 33.9 19.5 34.0

1990-91 32.0 12.2 32.7 15.2 11.0 16.3 34.6 19.7 34.7

1991-92 32.5 12.5 33.2 15.4 11.2 16.5 35.1 20.0 35.2

1992-93 32.5 12.6 33.1 15.6 11.4 16.6 35.0 19.9 35.1

1993-94 33.9 13.3 34.5 16.0 11.9 17.1 36.6 21.5 36.7

Northeast

1987-88 26.8 4.1 27.2 2.5 2.2 2.5 29.0 8.6 29.1

1988-89 26.9 4.8 27.3 2.7 3.0 2.7 29.1 8.6 29.2

1989-90 27.4 5.1 27.8 3.0 3.4 2.9 29.6 8.9 29.7

1990-91 27.9 4.4 28.3 2.9 2.5 3.0 30.1 9.0 30.2

1991-92 28.4 4.5 28.9 3.0 2.5 3.0 30.7 9.0 30.8

1992-93 28.5 4.5 28.9 3.0 2.5 3.0 30.7 9.0 30.9

1993-94 29.5 4.5 30.0 3.0 2.1 3.2 31.8 9.8 32.0

Southeast

1987-88 33.9 24.1 33.9 24.6 26.7 24.6 35.8 20.4 35.8

1988-89 34.0 22.4 34.0 24.8 27.0 24.8 35.8 15.2 35.8

1989-90 34.2 23.3 34.2 24.6 27.3 24.6 36.1 17.5 36.1

1990-91 34.5 22.5 34.5 24.6 27.8 24.6 36.4 14.8 36.4

1991-92 34.6 22.1 34.6 24.6 27.3 24.6 36.5 14.6 36.5

1992-93 34.4 21.6 34.4 24.6 27.1 24.6 36.3 14.3 36.3

1993-94 36.3 22.5 36.4 25.2 27.5 25.2 38.5 15.9 38.5

South Central

1987-88 42.7 25.0 44.0 26.2 25.1 27.0 45.3 23.8 45.5

1988-89 43.6 25.3 45.0 27.0 25.6 28.1 46.2 22.3 46.4

1989-90 43.5 23.2 45.0 25.1 23.5 26.4 46.4 20.7 46.7

1990-91 44.7 23.9 46.2 26.0 24.3 27.4 47.6 20.8 47.8

1991-92 45.3 24.0 46.7 26.4 24.5 27.8 48.2 19.8 48.4

1992-93 45.1 24.1 46.6 26.3 24.5 27.8 48.0 21.5 48.2

1993-94 46.6 24.9 48.1 27.1 25.3 28.4 49.7 21.8 49.9

Midwest

1987-88 18.3 4.6 19.3 4.6 4.4 4.6 21.6 6.6 21.7

1988-89 18.3 4.5 19.2 4.5 4.4 4.6 21.6 6.2 21.6

1989-90 18.5 4.3 19.5 4.3 4.1 4.4 21.9 6.2 22.0

1990-91 18.6 3.5 19.6 3.8 3.4 4.0 22.1 4.9 22.2

1991-92 18.9 3.5 20.0 3.9 3.4 4.1 22.5 5.0 22.6

1992-93 18.9 3.6 19.9 3.9 3.5 4.1 22.4 5.1 22.5

1993-94 19.6 3.8 20.7 4.1 3.7 4.2 23.3 5.6 23.4

West

1987-88 37.5 21.0 38.0 23.7 19.5 25.1 38.7 27.4 38.8

1988-89 38.5 23.1 39.0 23.8 19.9 25.0 39.8 32.6 39.8

1989-90 39.7 24.4 40.1 24.4 20.3 25.7 41.0 35.8 41.1

1990-91 40.8 25.1 41.3 24.7 20.7 26.0 42.2 37.3 42.2

1991-92 41.7 25.9 42.2 25.4 21.4 26.7 43.1 38.1 43.2

1992-93 41.6 25.5 42.0 25.8 21.2 27.3 42.9 37.4 43.0

1993-94 43.3 26.7 43.8 26.3 22.0 27.7 44.9 40.6 44.9
103

Table A4.2a. Number of students (in thousands) with IEPs in rural, small, and other school districts, by level

and year

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Elem Unified Second Total Elem Unified Second Total Elem Unified Second

Total

1987-88 3,689 179 3,439 70 516 25 486 5 3,173 154 2,953 65

1988-89 3,878 190 3,618 70 556 26 525 5 3,321 164 3,093 65

1989-90 4,070 194 3,806 70 584 28 551 5 3,485 166 3,255 65

1990-91 4,183 207 3,901 75 590 28 557 5 3,593 179 3,343 70

1991-92 4,274 210 3,988 76 607 29 573 5 3,667 181 3,415 71

1992-93 4,558 211 4,260 87 652 31 615 6 3,906 180 3,645 81

1993-94 4,736 223 4,424 89 670 31 633 6 4,066 193 3,791 82

Small

1987-88 126 15 107 4 109 11 96 2 17 5 11 1

1988-89 133 17 112 4 114 11 101 2 19 5 11 2

1989-90 139 18 117 4 118 12 103 2 22 6 14 2

1990-91 138 18 116 4 117 12 103 2 21 6 13 2

1991-92 146 18 123 5 123 12 108 3 23 6 15 2

1992-93 155 19 129 6 129 12 113 4 26 7 16 3

1993-94 157 19 132 6 130 12 115 3 27 7 17 3

Large

1987-88 3,563 164 3,332 67 407 14 390 3 3,156 150 2,942 64

1988-89 3,745 173 3,506 66 442 15 425 3 3,303 158 3,082 63

1989-90 3,931 176 3,689 66 467 16 448 3 3,464 160 3,241 63

1990-91 4,045 190 3,784 71 473 16 454 3 3,571 173 3,330 68

1991-92 4,128 192 3,864 72 484 17 464 3 3,644 175 3,400 69

1992-93 4,404 192 4,131 81 523 18 502 3 3,880 174 3,628 78

1993-94 4,579 204 4,293 82 540 19 519 3 4,040 186 3,774 79
104

Table A4.2b. Percentage of students with IEPs in rural, small, and other school districts, by level and year

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Elem Unified Second Total Elem Unified Second Total Elem Unified Second

Total

1987-88 6.3 3.7 6.5 3.4 6.2 4.5 6.3 4.8 6.3 3.6 6.5 3.3

1988-89 7.0 3.9 7.3 3.7 7.5 5.1 7.6 5.2 7.0 3.7 7.2 3.6

1989-90 8.5 8.2 8.6 7.2 8.3 9.6 8.3 8.6 8.6 8.0 8.7 7.1

1990-91 9.3 8.5 9.4 7.8 9.5 9.4 9.5 8.4 9.3 8.4 9.4 7.7

1991-92 9.2 8.4 9.3 7.4 9.5 9.2 9.6 8.2 9.1 8.2 9.3 7.3

1992-93 9.7 8.3 9.8 8.5 10.2 10.3 10.2 9.4 9.6 8.1 9.7 8.5

1993-94 10.4 8.7 10.5 8.6 10.9 10.4 10.9 8.9 10.3 8.5 10.5 8.5

Small

1987-88 7.5 6.1 7.7 6.2 7.5 6.0 7.7 4.6 7.5 6.4 7.8 9.5

1988-89 8.6 6.4 9.1 6.3 8.8 7.0 9.2 4.1 7.5 5.4 8.7 10.5

1989-90 9.6 9.4 9.5 10.5 9.4 10.9 9.2 8.8 10.6 7.3 13.0 14.0

1990-91 10.3 9.1 10.5 10.4 10.2 10.4 10.2 8.5 11.1 7.4 13.8 14.4

1991-92 10.7 8.9 11.1 9.7 10.6 10.0 10.7 8.0 11.6 7.5 14.8 13.3

1992-93 11.4 9.9 11.6 12.8 11.2 11.4 11.2 10.6 12.6 8.0 15.7 17.9

1993-94 11.7 10.0 11.9 12.7 11.4 11.5 11.5 9.5 13.2 8.0 16.5 21.1

Large

1987-88 6.2 3.5 6.5 3.3 5.9 3.7 6.0 5.0 6.3 3.5 6.5 3.2

1988-89 7.0 3.7 7.2 3.5 7.1 4.0 7.3 6.1 6.9 3.7 7.2 3.4

1989-90 8.5 8.1 8.6 7.1 8.1 8.8 8.0 8.5 8.6 8.0 8.6 7.0

1990-91 9.3 8.5 9.4 7.7 9.3 8.8 9.4 8.3 9.3 8.4 9.4 7.6

1991-92 9.1 8.3 9.2 7.3 9.3 8.8 9.3 8.3 9.1 8.3 9.2 7.3

1992-93 9.6 8.2 9.7 8.3 9.9 9.7 9.9 8.1 9.6 8.1 9.7 8.3

1993-94 10.3 8.6 10.5 8.4 10.7 9.9 10.8 8.3 10.3 8.5 10.5 8.4
105

Table A4.3. Percentage of LEP students in rural, small, and other school districts in 1990, by region

Total Rural Nonrural

NE SE SC MW West NE SE SC MW West NE SE SC MW West

Total 3.5 1.8 6.1 1.7 7.5 1.1 0.9 3.0 0.9 3.8 3.7 2.0 6.5 1.9 7.8

Small 0.9 1.2 1.9 0.8 2.5 0.7 1.1 1.9 0.8 2.5 1.3 1.5 1.6 0.7 2.6

Large 3.5 1.8 6.4 1.8 7.7 1.1 0.9 3.8 1.0 4.2 3.7 2.0 6.6 1.9 7.9
106

Table A4.4. Percentage of children in poverty in rural, small, and other school districts, by region and year

Total Rural Nonrural

NE SE SC MW W Total NE SE SC MW W Total NE SE SC MW 

Total1986-87 15.4 20.9 24.3 16.3 17.3 18.4 13.3 24.5 24.9 15.6 19.6 19.7 15.5 20.2 24.2 161987-88 15.4 20.9 24.3 16.2 17.3 18.3 13.2 24.5 24.9 15.7 19.6 19.6 15.6 20.1 24.2 161988-89 15.4 20.7 24.2 16.1 17.3 18.3 13.2 24.3 24.9 15.6 19.5 19.6 15.6 20.0 24.1 161989-90 15.4 20.6 23.9 16.1 17.3 18.2 13.2 24.2 24.8 15.6 19.5 19.5 15.6 19.9 23.8 161990-91 15.4 20.5 24.0 16.0 17.3 18.2 13.1 24.0 24.9 15.6 19.4 19.4 15.6 19.8 23.9 161991-92 15.4 20.3 23.9 15.9 17.3 18.1 13.1 23.9 25.0 15.6 19.4 19.4 15.6 19.6 23.7 151992-93 15.3 20.2 23.8 15.8 17.2 18.0 13.1 23.8 24.9 15.6 19.3 19.3 15.5 19.5 23.7 151993-94 15.3 20.0 23.7 15.7 17.2 17.9 13.0 23.5 24.9 15.5 19.3 19.2 15.5 19.4 23.6 15Small1986-87 14.2 27.2 24.7 17.2 20.3 19.2 15.3 24.3 25.1 17.3 20.9 19.6 11.8 31.7 21.5 161987-88 14.3 28.0 24.6 17.2 20.3 19.2 15.2 25.1 25.1 17.3 20.9 19.6 12.2 32.2 20.7 161988-89 14.1 27.8 24.6 17.2 21.2 19.4 15.2 24.8 25.1 17.3 20.9 19.5 11.8 32.3 20.6 161989-90 14.2 28.6 24.6 17.1 21.3 19.4 15.2 26.2 25.1 17.2 20.9 19.5 12.0 32.1 20.5 161990-91 14.3 28.5 24.5 17.1 21.3 19.3 15.2 26.1 25.1 17.2 20.9 19.5 12.0 32.0 20.2 151991-91 14.2 28.4 24.5 17.1 21.5 19.4 15.2 26.1 25.1 17.2 20.9 19.5 11.8 31.8 19.9 151992-93 14.2 28.3 24.5 17.1 21.5 19.4 15.2 25.8 25.0 17.2 21.0 19.5 11.8 31.5 20.3 151993-94 14.0 28.3 24.4 17.1 21.7 19.5 15.1 26.0 25.0 17.3 21.1 19.6 11.7 31.5 20.2 15Large1986-87 15.4 20.9 24.3 16.3 17.3 18.4 13.0 24.5 24.7 14.9 19.1 19.7 15.6 20.2 24.3 161987-88 15.4 20.8 24.2 16.2 17.2 18.3 12.8 24.5 24.7 14.9 19.1 19.6 15.6 20.1 24.2 161988-89 15.4 20.7 24.2 16.0 17.2 18.2 12.9 24.3 24.8 14.9 19.0 19.6 15.6 20.0 24.1 161989-90 15.4 20.6 23.9 16.0 17.2 18.2 12.8 24.2 24.5 14.9 19.0 19.5 15.6 19.9 23.8 161990-91 15.4 20.4 24.0 15.9 17.2 18.1 12.7 24.0 24.8 14.9 18.9 19.4 15.6 19.7 23.9 161991-92 15.4 20.3 23.9 15.8 17.1 18.0 12.7 23.9 24.8 14.9 18.9 19.3 15.6 19.6 23.8 151992-93 15.3 20.2 23.8 15.7 17.1 18.0 12.7 23.7 24.8 14.8 18.7 19.3 15.5 19.5 23.7 151993-94 15.3 20.0 23.7 15.6 17.1 17.9 12.6 23.5 24.8 14.8 18.7 19.2 15.5 19.4 23.6 15
107

Table A4.5a. Student enrollment in high, medium, and low poverty rural, small, and other school districts,

by year

Total Rural Nonrural

Poverty Poverty Poverty

High Medium Low High Medium Low High Medium Low

Total

1986-87 12,593,236 17,309,769 9,685,279 1,619,806 2,914,113 866,353 10,973,430 14,395,656 8,818,926

1987-88 12,558,629 17,456,088 9,734,711 1,606,756 2,911,173 879,107 10,951,873 14,544,915 8,855,604

1988-89 12,540,223 17,527,931 9,872,952 1,601,188 2,915,329 892,672 10,939,035 14,612,602 8,980,280

1989-90 12,541,276 17,748,180 10,021,498 1,587,883 2,931,732 903,370 10,953,393 14,816,448 9,118,128

1990-91 12,688,569 18,053,212 10,228,225 1,586,578 2,952,024 914,359 11,101,991 15,101,188 9,313,866

1991-92 12,816,565 18,484,830 10,511,148 1,598,386 3,001,486 934,645 11,218,179 15,483,344 9,576,503

1992-93 12,933,062 18,829,196 10,809,806 1,611,480 3,053,887 963,183 11,321,582 15,775,309 9,846,623

1993-94 13,015,028 19,166,280 11,015,770 1,623,582 3,104,956 981,998 11,391,446 16,061,324 10,033,772

Small

1986-87 372,288 725,822 195,519 331,737 640,148 150,762 40,551 85,674 44,757

1987-88 369,920 711,550 193,500 330,464 631,568 150,616 39,456 79,982 42,884

1988-89 384,070 710,847 197,191 328,245 629,457 151,518 55,825 81,390 45,673

1989-90 385,312 710,556 197,418 326,965 629,909 151,944 58,347 80,647 45,474

1990-91 383,877 709,659 199,709 324,641 630,810 151,701 59,236 78,849 48,008

1991-92 389,610 717,922 201,361 328,790 637,584 152,779 60,820 80,338 48,582

1992-93 396,926 722,650 205,670 334,329 641,933 154,501 62,597 80,717 51,169

1993-94 400,300 723,278 203,794 336,710 640,586 154,050 63,590 82,692 49,744

Large

1986-87 12,220,948 16,583,947 9,489,760 1,288,069 2,273,965 715,591 10,932,879 14,309,982 8,774,169

1987-88 12,188,709 16,744,538 9,541,211 1,276,292 2,279,605 728,491 10,912,417 14,464,933 8,812,720

1988-89 12,156,153 16,817,084 9,675,761 1,272,943 2,285,872 741,154 10,883,210 14,531,212 8,934,607

1989-90 12,155,964 17,037,624 9,824,080 1,260,918 2,301,823 751,426 10,895,046 14,735,801 9,072,654

1990-91 12,304,692 17,343,553 10,028,516 1,261,937 2,321,214 762,658 11,042,755 15,022,339 9,265,858

1991-92 12,426,955 17,766,908 10,309,787 1,269,596 2,363,902 781,866 11,157,359 15,403,006 9,527,921

1992-93 12,536,136 18,106,546 10,604,136 1,277,151 2,411,954 808,682 11,258,985 15,694,592 9,795,454

1993-94 12,614,728 18,443,002 10,811,976 1,286,872 2,464,370 827,948 11,327,856 15,978,632 9,984,028
108

Table A4.5b. Percentage distributions of student enrollment in high, medium, and low poverty rural,

small, and other school districts, by year

Total Rural Nonrural

Poverty Poverty Poverty

High Medium Low High Medium Low High Medium Low

Total

1986-87 31.8 43.7 24.5 30.0 54.0 16.0 32.1 42.1 25.8

1987-88 31.6 43.9 24.5 29.8 53.9 16.3 31.9 42.3 25.8

1988-89 31.4 43.9 24.7 29.6 53.9 16.5 31.7 42.3 26.0

1989-90 31.1 44.0 24.9 29.3 54.1 16.7 31.4 42.5 26.1

1990-91 31.0 44.1 25.0 29.1 54.1 16.8 31.3 42.5 26.2

1991-92 30.7 44.2 25.1 28.9 54.2 16.9 30.9 42.7 26.4

1992-93 30.4 44.2 25.4 28.6 54.3 17.1 30.6 42.7 26.7

1993-94 30.1 44.4 25.5 28.4 54.4 17.2 30.4 42.8 26.8

Small

1986-87 28.8 56.1 15.1 29.5 57.0 13.4 23.7 50.1 26.2

1987-88 29.0 55.8 15.2 29.7 56.8 13.5 24.3 49.3 26.4

1988-89 29.7 55.0 15.3 29.6 56.7 13.7 30.5 44.5 25.0

1989-90 29.8 54.9 15.3 29.5 56.8 13.7 31.6 43.7 24.7

1990-91 29.7 54.9 15.4 29.3 57.0 13.7 31.8 42.4 25.8

1991-92 29.8 54.8 15.4 29.4 57.0 13.7 32.1 42.3 25.6

1992-93 30.0 54.5 15.5 29.6 56.8 13.7 32.2 41.5 26.3

1993-94 30.2 54.5 15.4 29.8 56.6 13.6 32.4 42.2 25.4

Large

1986-87 31.9 43.3 24.8 30.1 53.2 16.7 32.1 42.1 25.8

1987-88 31.7 43.5 24.8 29.8 53.2 17.0 31.9 42.3 25.8

1988-89 31.5 43.5 25.0 29.6 53.2 17.2 31.7 42.3 26.0

1989-90 31.2 43.7 25.2 29.2 53.4 17.4 31.4 42.5 26.1

1990-91 31.0 43.7 25.3 29.0 53.4 17.5 31.3 42.5 26.2

1991-92 30.7 43.9 25.5 28.8 53.5 17.7 30.9 42.7 26.4

1992-93 30.4 43.9 25.7 28.4 53.6 18.0 30.6 42.7 26.7

1993-94 30.1 44.0 25.8 28.1 53.8 18.1 30.4 42.8 26.8
109

Table A5.1. Student/teacher ratios in rural, small, and other school districts, by level and year

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Elem Unified Second Total Elem Unified Second Total Elem Unified Second

Total

1987-88 17.7 19.1 17.6 18.4 16.2 16.1 16.2 13.5 17.9 19.6 17.8 18.9

1988-89 17.6 19.1 17.5 18.2 16.1 15.8 16.2 13.2 17.8 19.6 17.7 18.6

1989-90 17.4 19.1 17.3 18.0 15.9 15.6 15.9 12.8 17.6 19.7 17.5 18.5

1990-91 17.3 19.0 17.2 18.6 15.8 15.6 15.8 13.3 17.6 19.6 17.4 19.1

1991-92 17.6 19.4 17.4 19.0 16.0 16.2 16.0 14.1 17.8 20.0 17.7 19.5

1992-93 17.7 19.1 17.6 17.8 16.2 15.7 16.3 12.4 18.0 19.7 17.9 18.3

1993-94 17.5 19.1 17.4 17.7 16.0 15.6 16.0 12.9 17.8 19.6 17.7 18.3

Small

1987-88 13.2 13.3 13.3 10.5 13.2 12.9 13.3 11.0 12.7 14.1 12.6 9.5

1988-89 13.3 14.2 13.3 11.1 13.2 13.1 13.3 11.2 13.6 15.9 12.7 10.9

1989-90 13.1 14.2 13.0 10.4 13.0 13.0 13.0 10.6 13.6 16.1 12.5 9.9

1990-91 13.0 14.1 12.9 10.8 12.9 12.9 13.0 11.2 13.6 16.0 12.6 10.2

1991-92 13.3 14.5 13.1 11.5 13.2 13.2 13.2 12.2 13.9 16.5 12.9 10.3

1992-93 13.6 14.3 13.6 11.2 13.6 13.1 13.7 11.5 14.0 16.4 13.0 10.4

1993-94 13.4 14.3 13.4 11.6 13.3 12.9 13.4 12.3 14.0 16.6 12.9 10.2

Large

1987-88 17.9 19.8 17.8 19.0 17.2 18.9 17.1 16.4 18.0 19.9 17.9 19.1

1988-89 17.8 19.6 17.6 18.7 17.1 18.0 17.1 15.3 17.9 19.8 17.7 18.9

1989-90 17.6 19.7 17.4 18.6 16.8 17.7 16.8 15.2 17.7 19.9 17.5 18.7

1990-91 17.5 19.6 17.4 19.2 16.8 17.9 16.7 15.9 17.6 19.7 17.4 19.3

1991-92 17.8 20.0 17.6 19.6 17.0 18.5 16.9 16.3 17.9 20.1 17.7 19.7

1992-93 17.9 19.7 17.8 18.3 17.0 17.8 17.0 13.4 18.0 19.9 17.9 18.5

1993-94 17.7 19.6 17.6 18.2 16.8 17.7 16.8 13.5 17.8 19.8 17.7 18.5
110

Table A5.2. Per-pupil revenues in rural, small, and other school districts, by level and year

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Elem Unified Second Total Elem Unified Second Total Elem Unified Second

Total

1989-90 $5,793 $5,801 $5,746 $7,664 $5,268 $6,480 $5,157 $8,718 $5,874 $5,707 $5,839 $7,588

1990-91 $5,739 $5,578 $5,703 $7,619 $5,306 $6,344 $5,207 $8,691 $5,805 $5,476 $5,781 $7,546

1991-92 $5,589 $5,570 $5,546 $7,388 $5,173 $6,253 $5,070 $8,758 $5,653 $5,478 $5,621 $7,296

1992-93 $5,793 $5,657 $5,762 $7,372 $5,422 $6,367 $5,332 $8,408 $5,849 $5,563 $5,829 $7,299

Small

1989-90 $6,003 $6,696 $5,790 $8,412 $5,932 $6,836 $5,758 $8,541 $6,434 $6,514 $6,138 $8,114

1990-91 $6,028 $6,633 $5,832 $8,413 $5,975 $6,920 $5,795 $8,652 $6,354 $6,265 $6,248 $7,840

1991-92 $5,940 $6,521 $5,750 $8,328 $5,885 $6,762 $5,718 $8,445 $6,279 $6,211 $6,101 $8,067

1992-92 $6,266 $6,715 $6,136 $7,527 $6,220 $6,917 $6,104 $7,473 $6,548 $6,448 $6,492 $7,672

Large

1989-90 $5,786 $5,723 $5,745 $7,631 $5,098 $6,266 $5,016 $8,857 $5,871 $5,674 $5,838 $7,581

1990-91 $5,730 $5,490 $5,700 $7,585 $5,136 $6,011 $5,069 $8,726 $5,802 $5,445 $5,780 $7,543

1991-92 $5,578 $5,491 $5,540 $7,347 $4,992 $5,962 $4,918 $9,019 $5,650 $5,450 $5,619 $7,285

1992-93 $5,778 $5,572 $5,752 $7,365 $5,223 $6,054 $5,155 $9,322 $5,846 $5,530 $5,828 $7,295
111

Table A5.3a. Per-pupil revenues in rural, small, and other school districts, by region

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Small Large Total Small Large Total Small Large

United States

1989-90 $5,793 $6,003 $5,786 $5,268 $5,932 $5,098 $5,874 $6,434 $5,871

1990-91 $5,739 $6,028 $5,730 $5,306 $5,975 $5,136 $5,805 $6,354 $5,802

1991-92 $5,589 $5,940 $5,578 $5,173 $5,885 $4,992 $5,653 $6,279 $5,650

1992-93 $5,793 $6,266 $5,778 $5,422 $6,220 $5,223 $5,849 $6,548 $5,846

Northeast

1989-90 $8,110 $8,752 $8,098 $7,102 $8,433 $6,859 $8,199 $9,491 $8,192

1990-91 $7,982 $9,058 $7,962 $7,261 $8,770 $6,989 $8,046 $9,730 $8,036

1991-92 $7,859 $8,850 $7,840 $7,186 $8,512 $6,943 $7,918 $9,630 $7,908

1992-93 $7,986 $8,899 $7,969 $7,302 $8,589 $7,068 $8,046 $9,619 $8,037

Southeast

1989-90 $5,185 $4,434 $5,186 $4,498 $4,537 $4,497 $5,320 $4,292 $5,321

1990-91 $5,169 $4,453 $5,170 $4,585 $4,441 $4,586 $5,282 $4,470 $5,282

1991-92 $5,008 $4,337 $5,009 $4,394 $4,321 $4,394 $5,126 $4,359 $5,126

1992-93 $5,026 $5,193 $5,026 $4,575 $5,198 $4,572 $5,112 $5,185 $5,112

South Central

1989-90 $4,595 $5,070 $4,561 $4,815 $5,077 $4,609 $4,561 $5,015 $4,557

1990-91 $4,667 $5,276 $4,625 $5,008 $5,304 $4,780 $4,615 $5,059 $4,611

1991-92 $4,630 $5,332 $4,582 $5,028 $5,365 $4,772 $4,570 $5,071 $4,566

1992-93 $5,442 $6,529 $5,368 $6,018 $6,590 $5,590 $5,355 $6,049 $5,349

Midwest

1989-90 $5,621 $5,502 $5,629 $5,128 $5,505 $4,960 $5,737 $5,464 $5,739

1990-91 $5,602 $5,437 $5,613 $5,102 $5,439 $4,953 $5,719 $5,415 $5,721

1991-92 $5,427 $5,338 $5,433 $4,942 $5,343 $4,766 $5,541 $5,281 $5,543

1992-93 $5,736 $5,431 $5,756 $5,147 $5,427 $5,026 $5,874 $5,474 $5,876

West

1989-90 $5,422 $7,093 $5,378 $6,374 $7,415 $6,033 $5,342 $6,171 $5,336

1990-91 $5,292 $6,979 $5,248 $6,199 $7,382 $5,816 $5,216 $5,809 $5,212

1991-92 $5,111 $6,751 $5,069 $6,064 $7,129 $5,724 $5,031 $5,643 $5,027

1992-93 $5,186 $6,731 $5,146 $6,066 $7,058 $5,756 $5,110 $5,706 $5,106
112

Table A5.3b. Per-pupil revenues in rural, small, and other school districts, by state in 1992-93

Total Small Large

Total Rural Nonrural Total Rural Nonrural Total Rural Nonrural

50 States and D.C. $5,793 $6,266 $5,778 $5,422 $6,220 $5,223 $5,849 $6,548 $5,846

Alabama $3,885 n/a $3,885 $3,721 n/a $3,721 $3,937 n/a $3,937

Alaska $9,717 $14919 $9,165 $12099 $14919 $11171 $8,208 n/a $8,208

Arizona $5,035 $6,370 $5,009 $6,172 $6,552 $6,061 $4,960 $5,860 $4,955

Arkansas $4,345 $5,336 $4,200 $4,651 $5,381 $4,054 $4,235 $4,734 $4,229

California $5,155 $5,823 $5,147 $5,622 $6,715 $5,452 $5,137 $5,229 $5,137

Colorado $5,596 $6,783 $5,547 $6,375 $6,771 $6,201 $5,482 $7,183 $5,480

Connecticut $8,595 $12050 $8,574 $10346 $12218 $9,996 $8,549 $11698 $8,543

Delaware $6,554 n/a $6,554 $7,542 n/a $7,542 $6,355 n/a $6,355

District of Columbia $8,782 n/a $8,782 n/a n/a n/a $8,782 n/a $8,782

Florida $5,713 n/a $5,713 $5,542 n/a $5,542 $5,717 n/a $5,717

Georgia $5,098 $5,926 $5,097 $4,717 $5,926 $4,708 $5,157 n/a $5,157

Hawaii $5,973 n/a $5,973 n/a n/a n/a $5,973 n/a $5,973

Idaho $3,826 $4,887 $3,760 $4,114 $4,847 $3,924 $3,717 $5,831 $3,710

Illinois $5,503 $4,563 $5,547 $4,344 $4,478 $4,264 $5,628 $4,937 $5,634

Indiana $6,027 $5,869 $6,028 $5,515 $6,019 $5,509 $6,129 $5,697 $6,129

Iowa $5,437 $5,834 $5,347 $5,701 $5,852 $5,470 $5,329 $5,481 $5,327

Kansas $5,287 $5,931 $5,183 $5,445 $5,945 $5,186 $5,186 $5,642 $5,182

Kentucky $4,774 $5,369 $4,769 $4,656 $5,490 $4,645 $4,818 $5,290 $4,815

Louisiana $4,302 n/a $4,302 $4,340 n/a $4,340 $4,299 n/a $4,299

Maine $6,375 $7,362 $6,282 $6,677 $7,484 $6,337 $6,277 $6,712 $6,269

Maryland $6,520 n/a $6,520 $6,059 n/a $6,059 $6,577 n/a $6,577

Massachusetts $6,859 $7,932 $6,848 $6,857 $6,312 $6,903 $6,859 $8,425 $6,847

Michigan $6,340 $5,723 $6,352 $5,264 $5,731 $5,200 $6,506 $5,679 $6,508

Minnesota $5,941 $5,916 $5,943 $5,646 $5,919 $5,491 $6,023 $5,775 $6,024

Mississippi $3,617 $5,206 $3,614 $3,643 $5,206 $3,633 $3,604 n/a $3,604

Missouri $4,370 $3,835 $4,426 $3,510 $3,809 $3,311 $4,623 $4,491 $4,624

Montana $5,047 $5,962 $4,770 $5,542 $5,985 $4,898 $4,779 $5,761 $4,741

Nebraska $5,583 $6,130 $5,375 $5,845 $6,154 $4,950 $5,450 $5,888 $5,432

Nevada $3,563 $10556 $3,534 $5,064 $10556 $4,820 $3,402 n/a $3,402

New Hampshire $6,167 $7,354 $6,086 $6,723 $7,811 $6,401 $6,036 $6,385 $6,027

New Jersey $9,831 $12139 $9,805 $9,929 $11981 $9,753 $9,827 $12201 $9,807

New Mexico $4,462 $6,811 $4,369 $5,269 $6,811 $4,850 $4,286 n/a $4,286

New York $8,494 $9,470 $8,475 $8,111 $9,198 $7,818 $8,521 $10201 $8,512

North Carolina $5,009 n/a $5,009 $4,902 n/a $4,902 $5,038 n/a $5,038

North Dakota $4,602 $5,300 $4,221 $5,172 $5,300 $4,600 $4,168 n/a $4,168

Ohio $5,894 $4,756 $5,901 $4,793 $4,649 $4,797 $6,125 $5,290 $6,126

Oklahoma $4,534 $5,857 $4,274 $5,281 $5,969 $4,194 $4,317 $5,274 $4,283

Oregon $5,815 $6,583 $5,771 $6,379 $6,648 $6,002 $5,779 $6,470 $5,765

Pennsylvania $6,873 $6,840 $6,873 $6,118 $6,184 $6,117 $6,986 $7,916 $6,985

Rhode Island $6,592 $13912 $6,586 $7,638 $13912 $7,519 $6,539 n/a $6,539

South Carolina $4,765 $5,045 $4,765 $4,805 $5,045 $4,801 $4,759 n/a $4,759

South Dakota $4,459 $5,008 $4,246 $4,855 $4,991 $4,568 $4,187 $6,991 $4,175

Tennessee $3,856 $3,284 $3,857 $3,423 $3,457 $3,423 $3,932 $3,020 $3,932

Texas $5,726 $7,484 $5,656 $6,741 $7,499 $6,328 $5,615 $7,348 $5,607

Utah $3,539 $6,720 $3,525 $4,921 $6,720 $4,798 $3,441 n/a $3,441

Vermont $7,998 $8,197 $7,929 $8,241 $8,185 $8,364 $7,873 $8,310 $7,857

Virginia $5,203 $4,970 $5,204 $4,526 $4,528 $4,526 $5,414 $5,326 $5,414

Washington $5,850 $6,922 $5,810 $6,010 $6,935 $5,752 $5,821 $6,714 $5,819

West Virginia $5,753 n/a $5,753 $5,650 n/a $5,650 $5,819 n/a $5,819

Wisconsin $6,436 $6,861 $6,412 $6,370 $6,845 $6,225 $6,454 $7,047 $6,451

Wyoming $6,131 $9,042 $5,977 $7,283 $8,229 $7,021 $5,855 $13198 $5,780
113

Table A5.4. Percentage of local, state, and federal revenues in rural, small, and other school districts by

year

Total Rural Nonrural

Local State Federal Local State Federal Local State Federal

Total

1989-90 47.2 47.1 5.7 40.6 52.6 6.8 48.1 46.3 5.5

1990-91 47.3 46.9 5.8 40.1 53.1 6.9 48.3 46.0 5.7

1991-92 48.0 45.6 6.4 40.8 51.8 7.4 49.0 44.8 6.2

1992-93 47.4 46.4 6.2 39.5 53.3 7.3 48.5 45.4 6.1

Small

1989-90 47.7 45.9 6.1 47.4 46.2 6.4 49.6 44.2 4.8

1990-91 46.5 47.3 6.2 45.8 47.8 6.4 50.7 44.4 5.0

1991-92 47.3 46.1 6.6 46.5 46.6 6.9 51.6 43.3 5.1

1992-93 45.0 48.4 6.6 44.2 49.0 6.8 50.2 44.7 5.2

Large

1989-90 47.2 47.1 5.7 38.6 54.5 6.9 48.1 46.3 5.5

1990-91 47.3 46.9 5.8 38.4 54.6 7.0 48.3 46.0 5.7

1991-92 48.0 45.6 6.4 39.1 53.4 7.6 49.0 44.8 6.2

1992-93 47.5 46.3 6.2 38.1 54.5 7.4 48.5 45.4 6.1
114

Table A5.5. Percentage of students enrolled in low, medium, and high per-pupil revenue districts in rural, 

small, and other school districts, by year

Total Rural Nonrural

Low Medium High Low Medium High Low Medium High

Total

1989-90 22.0 58.1 20.0 33.5 55.7 10.8 20.2 58.4 21.4

1990-91 22.1 58.9 19.0 31.8 57.4 10.7 20.6 59.1 20.3

1991-92 22.7 58.9 18.4 34.9 54.0 11.1 20.8 59.7 19.5

1992-93 25.0 58.4 16.6 34.8 54.1 11.1 23.5 59.1 17.4

Small

1989-90 21.8 57.0 21.2 21.9 57.8 20.3 21.0 52.0 27.0

1990-91 22.1 56.3 21.6 22.2 57.1 20.7 20.9 52.1 27.0

1991-92 22.1 56.1 21.9 22.3 56.5 21.2 20.9 53.2 25.9

1992-93 17.8 58.9 23.3 18.1 59.1 22.9 16.3 58.1 25.6

Large

1989-90 22.0 58.1 19.9 36.5 55.2 8.4 20.2 58.5 21.4

1990-91 22.1 59.0 18.9 34.3 57.5 8.2 20.6 59.1 20.2

1991-92 22.7 59.0 18.3 38.1 53.3 8.6 20.8 59.7 19.5

1992-93 25.2 58.4 16.4 39.0 52.9 8.1 23.5 59.1 17.4
115

Table A5.6. Student/teacher ratios in low, medium, and high per-pupil revenue districts in rural, small, and

other school districts, by year

Total Rural Nonrural

Low Medium High Low Medium High Low Medium High

Total

1989-90 18.5 17.8 15.2 17.4 15.7 13.2 18.8 18.2 15.4

1990-91 18.5 17.7 15.2 17.4 15.7 12.9 18.8 18.0 15.4

1991-92 18.5 18.0 15.5 17.2 15.9 13.5 18.9 18.3 15.7

1992-93 18.9 18.1 15.2 17.3 16.2 13.3 19.2 18.4 15.4

Small

1989-90 14.4 13.4 11.2 14.3 13.2 11.3 15.4 14.8 10.8

1990-91 14.7 13.3 11.1 14.5 13.1 11.2 15.7 14.7 10.9

1991-92 14.8 13.6 11.4 14.5 13.4 11.5 16.3 15.0 11.1

1992-93 15.0 14.3 11.5 14.7 14.1 11.6 17.2 15.1 10.9

Large

1989-90 18.7 18.0 15.4 17.9 16.5 14.8 18.8 18.2 15.4

1990-91 18.7 17.9 15.4 17.9 16.5 14.3 18.8 18.1 15.5

1991-92 18.7 18.2 15.7 17.7 16.7 15.2 18.9 18.3 15.7

1992-93 19.0 18.3 15.4 17.7 16.8 14.9 19.3 18.4 15.5
116

Table A5.7. Per-pupil expenditures in rural, small, and other school districts, by level and year

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Elem Unified Second Total Elem Unified Second Total Elem Unified Second

Total

1989-90 $5,885 $5,803 $5,849 $7,542 $5,315 $6,418 $5,215 $8,393 $5,973 $5,719 $5,949 $7,481

1990-91 $5,767 $5,651 $5,731 $7,549 $5,283 $6,309 $5,188 $8,378 $5,841 $5,564 $5,816 $7,493

1991-92 $5,685 $5,699 $5,640 $7,458 $5,244 $6,295 $5,148 $8,421 $5,752 $5,619 $5,717 $7,393

1992-93 $5,714 $5,518 $5,688 $7,293 $5,324 $6,109 $5,245 $8,245 $5,773 $5,441 $5,757 $7,226

Small

1989-90 $6,039 $6,659 $5,846 $8,250 $5,984 $6,853 $5,819 $8,413 $6,376 $6,406 $6,149 $7,872

1990-91 $5,980 $6,610 $5,791 $8,037 $5,924 $6,840 $5,757 $8,259 $6,317 $6,315 $6,166 $7,506

1991-92 $5,993 $6,566 $5,823 $7,885 $5,939 $6,771 $5,794 $7,916 $6,324 $6,301 $6,143 $7,816

1992-93 $6,004 $6,369 $5,876 $7,568 $5,978 $6,616 $5,857 $7,558 $6,164 $6,041 $6,088 $7,594

Large

1989-90 $5,880 $5,729 $5,849 $7,511 $5,144 $6,158 $5,072 $8,378 $5,971 $5,691 $5,948 $7,476

1990-91 $5,760 $5,572 $5,729 $7,528 $5,120 $6,003 $5,054 $8,481 $5,839 $5,534 $5,815 $7,493

1991-92 $5,675 $5,627 $5,635 $7,439 $5,068 $6,023 $4,996 $8,842 $5,749 $5,592 $5,716 $7,387

1992-93 $5,705 $5,450 $5,682 $7,280 $5,161 $5,820 $5,104 $8,915 $5,771 $5,418 $5,756 $7,221
117

Table A5.8a. Per-pupil expenditures in rural, small, and other school districts, by region

Total Rural Nonrural

Total Small Large Total Small Large Total Small Large

United States

1989-90 $5,885 $6,039 $5,880 $5,315 $5,984 $5,144 $5,973 $6,376 $5,971

1990-91 $5,767 $5,980 $5,760 $5,283 $5,924 $5,120 $5,841 $6,317 $5,839

1991-92 $5,685 $5,993 $5,675 $5,244 $5,939 $5,068 $5,752 $6,324 $5,749

1992-93 $5,714 $6,004 $5,705 $5,324 $5,978 $5,161 $5,773 $6,164 $5,771

Northeast

1989-90 $8,182 $8,947 $8,168 $7,334 $8,752 $7,075 $8,257 $9,400 $8,250

1990-91 $7,970 $8,954 $7,952 $7,416 $8,770 $7,172 $8,019 $9,382 $8,011

1991-92 $7,885 $8,664 $7,871 $7,216 $8,353 $7,008 $7,944 $9,382 $7,936

1992-93 $7,854 $8,462 $7,843 $7,187 $8,204 $7,003 $7,912 $9,059 $7,906

Southeast

1989-90 $5,276 $4,480 $5,277 $4,547 $4,588 $4,547 $5,419 $4,331 $5,420

1990-91 $5,211 $4,295 $5,212 $4,563 $4,373 $4,564 $5,336 $4,183 $5,337

1991-92 $5,019 $4,238 $5,020 $4,481 $4,304 $4,482 $5,122 $4,143 $5,122

1992-93 $4,962 $4,405 $4,962 $4,573 $4,477 $4,573 $5,035 $4,302 $5,036

South Central

1989-90 $4,908 $5,319 $4,879 $5,038 $5,322 $4,816 $4,888 $5,303 $4,885

1990-91 $4,581 $5,123 $4,544 $4,823 $5,147 $4,573 $4,545 $4,938 $4,541

1991-92 $4,729 $5,245 $4,694 $4,982 $5,260 $4,769 $4,691 $5,120 $4,688

1992-93 $4,929 $5,327 $4,902 $5,151 $5,369 $4,987 $4,895 $4,992 $4,894

Midwest

1989-90 $5,652 $5,465 $5,664 $5,107 $5,474 $4,943 $5,781 $5,356 $5,783

1990-91 $5,574 $5,460 $5,582 $5,059 $5,461 $4,880 $5,695 $5,453 $5,697

1991-92 $5,606 $5,537 $5,611 $5,083 $5,548 $4,878 $5,729 $5,406 $5,731

1992-93 $5,753 $5,581 $5,764 $5,229 $5,587 $5,075 $5,875 $5,498 $5,878

West

1989-90 $5,489 $6,973 $5,450 $6,295 $7,321 $5,960 $5,421 $5,976 $5,417

1990-91 $5,451 $6,900 $5,413 $6,211 $7,217 $5,885 $5,388 $5,977 $5,383

1991-92 $5,265 $6,724 $5,227 $6,044 $7,027 $5,731 $5,199 $5,837 $5,195

1992-93 $5,238 $6,650 $5,202 $5,921 $7,006 $5,582 $5,179 $5,534 $5,177
118

Table A5.8b. Per-pupil expenditures by state in rural, small, and other school districts, by state in 1992

Total Small Large

Total Rural Nonrural Total Rural Nonrural Total Rural Nonrural

50 States and D.C. $5,714 $6,004 $5,705 $5,324 $5,978 $5,161 $5,773 $6,164 $5,771

Alabama $3,853 n/a $3,853 $3,734 n/a $3,734 $3,891 n/a $3,891

Alaska $8,802 $14325 $8,215 $10958 $14325 $9,850 $7,435 n/a $7,435

Arizona $5,081 $6,747 $5,048 $6,070 $6,936 $5,815 $5,016 $6,214 $5,009

Arkansas $4,262 $4,615 $4,210 $4,356 $4,627 $4,134 $4,228 $4,458 $4,225

California $5,155 $5,500 $5,151 $5,412 $6,433 $5,254 $5,145 $4,878 $5,147

Colorado $5,352 $6,285 $5,313 $5,446 $6,280 $5,081 $5,338 $6,439 $5,336

Connecticut $8,530 $10904 $8,515 $9,395 $11000 $9,095 $8,507 $10701 $8,502

Delaware $6,635 n/a $6,635 $7,168 n/a $7,168 $6,527 n/a $6,527

District of Columbia $9,230 n/a $9,230 n/a n/a n/a $9,230 n/a $9,230

Florida $5,638 n/a $5,638 $5,354 n/a $5,354 $5,645 n/a $5,645

Georgia $4,931 $4,637 $4,931 $4,593 $4,637 $4,592 $4,983 n/a $4,983

Hawaii $5,991 n/a $5,991 n/a n/a n/a $5,991 n/a $5,991

Idaho $3,805 $4,902 $3,736 $4,019 $4,859 $3,802 $3,724 $5,914 $3,716

Illinois $5,669 $4,506 $5,723 $4,380 $4,435 $4,348 $5,807 $4,821 $5,817

Indiana $5,827 $5,693 $5,827 $5,357 $5,764 $5,351 $5,920 $5,612 $5,920

Iowa $5,406 $5,698 $5,340 $5,649 $5,710 $5,556 $5,307 $5,462 $5,305

Kansas $5,509 $6,617 $5,330 $5,788 $6,633 $5,348 $5,332 $6,297 $5,322

Kentucky $4,476 $4,170 $4,479 $4,376 $4,448 $4,375 $4,513 $3,986 $4,517

Louisiana $4,187 n/a $4,187 $4,331 n/a $4,331 $4,174 n/a $4,174

Maine $6,084 $6,876 $6,009 $6,337 $6,882 $6,107 $6,002 $6,842 $5,987

Maryland $6,436 n/a $6,436 $6,004 n/a $6,004 $6,489 n/a $6,489

Massachusetts $6,216 $7,150 $6,207 $6,405 $5,943 $6,443 $6,210 $7,517 $6,201

Michigan $6,423 $5,970 $6,431 $5,371 $5,977 $5,289 $6,584 $5,931 $6,587

Minnesota $6,351 $6,294 $6,356 $6,189 $6,307 $6,122 $6,397 $5,747 $6,398

Mississippi $3,538 $4,143 $3,537 $3,587 $4,143 $3,584 $3,512 n/a $3,512

Missouri $4,778 $4,138 $4,845 $3,820 $4,109 $3,626 $5,060 $4,874 $5,061

Montana $5,132 $6,175 $4,816 $5,807 $6,211 $5,222 $4,766 $5,870 $4,723

Nebraska $5,589 $6,030 $5,422 $5,785 $6,072 $4,956 $5,489 $5,607 $5,485

Nevada $5,430 $10037 $5,411 $6,193 $10037 $6,022 $5,348 n/a $5,348

New Hampshire $5,920 $7,156 $5,835 $6,401 $7,641 $6,034 $5,807 $6,131 $5,798

New Jersey $9,392 $11254 $9,371 $9,330 $11104 $9,178 $9,395 $11312 $9,379

New Mexico $4,418 $6,467 $4,336 $5,148 $6,467 $4,790 $4,259 n/a $4,259

New York $8,508 $9,239 $8,494 $7,951 $9,043 $7,656 $8,547 $9,767 $8,541

North Carolina $4,845 n/a $4,845 $4,846 n/a $4,846 $4,844 n/a $4,844

North Dakota $4,648 $5,273 $4,307 $5,194 $5,273 $4,843 $4,232 n/a $4,232

Ohio $5,332 $4,594 $5,337 $4,444 $4,518 $4,442 $5,519 $4,976 $5,519

Oklahoma $4,368 $4,987 $4,246 $4,767 $5,082 $4,270 $4,252 $4,495 $4,243

Oregon $5,785 $6,454 $5,747 $6,184 $6,446 $5,816 $5,760 $6,467 $5,745

Pennsylvania $7,000 $6,634 $7,001 $6,380 $6,079 $6,383 $7,093 $7,543 $7,093

Rhode Island $6,391 $11480 $6,387 $6,779 $11480 $6,690 $6,372 n/a $6,372

South Carolina $4,577 $4,914 $4,576 $4,642 $4,914 $4,638 $4,567 n/a $4,567

South Dakota $4,571 $5,230 $4,316 $5,063 $5,228 $4,713 $4,234 $5,467 $4,229

Tennessee $3,800 $2,935 $3,801 $3,244 $3,021 $3,244 $3,897 $2,805 $3,898

Texas $5,103 $5,853 $5,073 $5,554 $5,865 $5,384 $5,053 $5,736 $5,050

Utah $3,523 $6,753 $3,509 $4,479 $6,753 $4,324 $3,455 n/a $3,455

Vermont $7,539 $7,641 $7,504 $7,733 $7,620 $7,985 $7,439 $7,851 $7,424

Virginia $5,566 $5,126 $5,567 $5,066 $4,756 $5,067 $5,722 $5,425 $5,722

Washington $6,243 $7,377 $6,201 $6,430 $7,366 $6,169 $6,209 $7,553 $6,206

West Virginia $5,733 n/a $5,733 $5,725 n/a $5,725 $5,738 n/a $5,738

Wisconsin $6,644 $7,220 $6,612 $6,676 $7,187 $6,521 $6,636 $7,589 $6,631

Wyoming $6,008 $9,059 $5,847 $6,912 $8,185 $6,561 $5,792 $13526 $5,713
119

Table A5.9. Percentage of expenditures for core instruction, administrative support, and capital outlay in rural,

small, and other school districts

Total Rural Nonrural

General General General

Core Admin and Capital Core Admin and Capital Core Admin and Capital

Instruction Support Outlay Instruction Support Outlay Instruction Support Outlay

Total

1989-90 61.2 25.6 13.2 58.7 28.0 13.3 61.5 25.2 13.2

1990-91 62.7 25.6 11.7 60.9 26.8 12.3 63.0 25.5 11.6

1991-92 62.8 25.8 11.4 60.8 26.7 12.4 63.1 25.7 11.2

1992-93 61.9 26.9 11.1 59.4 28.3 12.3 62.3 26.7 11.0

Small

1989-90 56.9 28.8 14.3 56.8 29.1 14.1 57.5 27.1 15.4

1990-91 58.7 28.6 12.7 58.9 28.8 12.2 57.5 27.2 15.2

1991-92 59.0 28.7 12.3 59.1 28.9 12.0 58.3 27.7 14.0

1992-93 58.3 29.3 12.4 58.2 29.5 12.3 59.0 28.0 13.0

Large

1989-90 61.3 25.5 13.2 59.2 27.6 13.1 61.6 25.2 13.2

1990-91 62.8 25.5 11.6 61.5 26.3 12.3 63.0 25.5 11.6

1991-92 62.9 25.7 11.4 61.4 26.1 12.5 63.1 25.7 11.2

1992-93 62.1 26.8 11.1 59.8 27.9 12.3 62.3 26.7 11.0
120

Table A5.10. Percentage of students in low, medium, and high per-pupil expenditure districts, by year

Total Rural Nonrural

Low Medium High Low Medium High Low Medium High

Total

1989-90 20.4 59.4 20.2 34.5 53.7 11.8 18.2 60.3 21.5

1990-91 22.5 57.0 20.5 34.3 53.2 12.5 20.7 57.5 21.7

1991-92 22.1 59.3 18.6 34.9 52.6 12.5 20.1 60.3 19.6

1992-93 23.4 57.9 18.7 33.0 55.4 11.7 22.0 58.3 19.7

Small

1989-90 22.4 56.7 21.0 22.8 57.0 20.3 20.1 54.7 25.2

1990-91 20.9 58.4 20.7 21.0 59.0 20.0 20.5 54.7 24.9

1991-92 19.6 59.5 20.9 19.5 60.4 20.1 20.2 54.5 25.3

1992-93 19.7 59.4 21.0 19.3 60.4 20.3 21.8 53.4 24.8

Large

1989-90 20.3 59.5 20.2 37.5 52.8 9.7 18.2 60.3 21.5

1990-91 22.6 56.9 20.5 37.7 51.7 10.6 20.7 57.5 21.7

1991-92 22.2 59.3 18.6 38.8 50.6 10.6 20.1 60.3 19.5

1992-93 23.5 57.9 18.6 36.4 54.1 9.5 22.0 58.3 19.7
121

Table A5.11. Student/teacher ratios in low, medium, and high per-pupil expenditure districts

Total Rural Nonrural

Low Medium High Low Medium High Low Medium High

Total

1989-90 18.5 17.8 15.3 17.4 15.6 13.5 18.8 18.2 15.5

1990-91 18.3 17.7 15.4 17.4 15.5 13.5 18.6 18.1 15.6

1991-92 18.5 18.0 15.6 17.4 15.7 13.9 18.8 18.3 15.8

1992-93 18.7 18.1 15.6 17.5 16.0 13.7 19.0 18.5 15.8

Small

1989-90 14.5 13.4 11.1 14.4 13.2 11.3 15.7 14.7 10.6

1990-91 15.0 13.2 11.2 14.8 13.0 11.3 15.9 14.5 10.8

1991-92 15.1 13.5 11.4 14.9 13.3 11.5 16.8 14.9 10.9

1992-93 15.6 14.0 11.5 15.4 13.9 11.6 16.9 14.7 11.1

Large

1989-90 18.7 18.0 15.5 17.9 16.5 15.1 18.9 18.2 15.5

1990-91 18.5 17.9 15.6 17.8 16.5 14.9 18.6 18.1 15.6

1991-92 18.6 18.2 15.8 17.8 16.7 15.4 18.8 18.3 15.8

1992-93 18.8 18.3 15.8 17.8 16.8 15.2 19.0 18.5 15.8
122
123

Appendix B. Technical Notes

Common Core of Data Analysis File Development

Source Files. The Common Core of Data (CCD) Local Education Agency (Nonfiscal) File

has one record for each of about 16,000 “districts” each year. The basic data source for this report

was the set of CCD files for the 8 years from 1986-87 to 1993-94.

Because there are a noticeable number (somewhat fewer than 2,000) records on the file that

do not correspond to regular school districts, but rather to administrative entities (e.g., regional

resource districts) concerned indirectly with elementary and secondary education, an extract of the

“regular school districts” was made. This extract was based on a reported “district type,” and two

types out of seven were included in the extract. These were (1) “regular school districts” and (2)

educational components of “supervisory union districts,” which, where they exist in some states, are

similar to regular school districts. Examination of the file led to the conclusion that in a few states

and years, some districts were mistyped. In those cases, the type was made consistent over years to

support more accurate analysis. 

After deletion of 33 records for which there was no gradespan information in any year, there

were 15,584 school districts on the analysis file; however, not all of these districts were operating

in every year between 1986-87 and 1993-94.

Districts Added or Deleted Between Years. On the analysis file, 15,345 districts had data

indicating that they were in operation in 1986-87, while only 14,648 were in operation in 1993-94.

The vast majority of the districts on this file were in operation in every one of the 8 years studied.

However, two facts are clear: (1) 239 districts were not present in 1986-87 but were for some later

year, and (2) there were 697 fewer districts in 1993-94 than there had been in 1986-87. This reflects

the dynamic nature of the local governance structure for public education. Declining populations

in some areas led to pressures to consolidate (combine) districts to reduce administrative overhead,

and rising populations in other areas led to pressures to split large districts and create new

administrative units.

Between one year and the next, the most frequent school district change was the

consolidation of two (or more) districts into a single district. Sometimes, these consolidations

combined elementary and secondary districts into unified districts; more frequently they consisted

of the closure of a small district and transfer of its students to another nearby district. In some cases,

a district simply absorbed the enrollment of an adjacent district but continued its existing identity;

in others both component districts were replaced with the creation of a new consolidated district with

a new identity. Because the linkage of each district to its predecessors was not explicitly recorded

in the Common Core of Data, it is difficult from these data to differentiate between new districts

created from consolidations and new districts created from the splitting of a large district. 

“New” Districts Resulting from Consolidations or Splits. In order to understand the

dynamics of districts, it is important to distinguish between “new” districts that are combinations of

previous districts and “new” districts that are spin-offs from existing districts that have grown.
124

Therefore, an attempt was made to pair each district that newly appeared on the file in a particular

year with a district in the same county that closed after the preceding year. To do this, for every

district that closed in a year, a district was sought that either newly appeared the next year or

otherwise added an appropriate number of students. Because CCD does not uniformly delete

districts from the file in the first year after they close, districts were considered to have closed for

the purpose of this study if they dropped from an enrollment of 25 or more to an enrollment of 0 and

did not add enrollment in a later year. 

Of course, enrollments change from year to year, but large discontinuities of enrollment can

be matched. For example, if a district with 83 students in 1988-89 closed and the enrollment in

another district in the same county increased from 255 to 326 between 1988-89 and 1989-90, it

would be reasonable to conclude that the latter district inherited the students of the former district.

Through trial implementations of this procedure, it was determined that transfer of enrollments of

fewer than 25 students could not be reliably detected in this manner, because the addition of fewer

than 25 students would not be so unusual as to be noticeable as a discontinuity. 

Most consolidations involving transfer of 25 or more students from a closing district were

identified. From the identifications made, we know that most new districts were created out of

consolidations during this period: overall, 128 “new” districts were created when 237 districts

consolidated; 286 districts were folded into other districts, but only 6 districts were identified as

resulting from the splits of 3 districts. Thus, it is reasonable to conjecture that most “new” districts

in this time period were created through consolidations. However, the identification process was

incomplete. Across the 7 years, a total of 106 “new” districts could not be unambiguously paired

based on enrollment discontinuities. Moreover, it was impossible to identify where students from

districts with fewer than 25 enrollment moved when their districts closed. 

Because the matching of “new” districts to predecessors was incomplete, it was impossible

to produce separate reliable counts of “new” districts created from consolidations and from splits.

 Therefore, for this report, districts referred to as “new” or “opening” include both types, although

nearly all are probably created from the consolidations of other districts. Very few districts, perhaps

only a handful, split to form new districts during this 7-year interval. 

Definition of Variables 

District Locale (“Rural”). Because information was not available from the 1990 Census

when this report was being prepared, information from the 1980 U.S. Census was used to classify

the locales of addresses of schools for CCD during the 1980s (and for this report) as rural, small or

large town, or fringes or central areas of mid-size or large cities. The CCD school locale codes are

used in this report to define districts as “rural.” Specifically, according to the standard CCD

definition, the district locale code is set to the modal school locale code for schools in the district.

A rural school district is defined as a district in which the most frequent school locale code is “7”

(i.e., rural). All other districts are defined as “not rural.”

 Examination of the results of this categorization led to a finding that the locale codes

recorded in CCD for schools in two states were inconsistent. Therefore, in these two states, the
125

Common Core of Data (CCD) definition of rural districts was checked against other data sources.

These data sources included the locale code of a district based on Census population counts by

school district from the School District Data Book (SDDB) and the locale code of a county based

on the location classification from U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Statistics

(ERS) data. A set of rules were developed to determine whether a district in these two states was

rural or nonrural. Since these sources used data from 1990, the rules were applied to the districts in

the 1990-91 school year of the CCD. Based on these data checks, CCD rural classifications of 491

out of 15,035 districts were changed for this report: 314 districts originally called nonrural were

relabeled rural, and 179 were changed from a rural to a nonrural label.

District Size (“Small”). A small district (as well as a small school) is defined as a district

that had a total enrollment of fewer than 25 students per grade for grades 8 and lower that it served,

and fewer than 100 students per grade for grades 9 and above. The enrollment that was used for this

classification was for 1987-88 or for its first year on the CCD file if it was not on the file for 1987-

88. Thus, for example, characteristics of small rural districts in 1993-94 are the characteristics in

1993-94 of districts that were categorized as small in 1987-88.

Of course, these are essentially the same districts that had small enrollments in 1993-94. Of

4,238 small rural districts counted in 1993-94 (based on the 1987-88 definition), 4,003 were still

small in 1993-94, and only 17 (0.4 percent) had 1993-94 enrollments more than 50 percent over the

threshold. Only one “outlier,” a district that merged with a large nonrural district in 1988-89 but

retained its identity on the file, had a 1993-94 enrollment more than 3 times the threshold: a K-8

district with 1,281 students in 1993-94. To balance these districts, 91 of the 9,596 districts not

categorized as small based on 1987-88 enrollments had small enrollments in 1993-94, but only 7 of

these had enrollments less than 70 percent of the threshold, and 5 of the 7 had enrollments of zero,

indicating that they would probably be verified as closures in 1994-95. These few exceptions could

only have slight effects on population summary statistics. 

Because any particular definition of “small rural districts” might not accurately reflect the

general intuition about what education in small rural areas in America might be, two alternative

definitions were considered, and parallel sets of analyses were conducted to determine the sensitivity

of the findings in this report to the definition of “small.” The numbers of additional "small rural"

districts added to the original count in each state by these expansions of the definition of small are

shown in table B1. 

Including all large rural districts with a majority of small schools. First, the finding that

there were no small rural districts in Alabama, Louisiana, and West Virginia led to an examination

of the CCD characteristics of (large) rural districts in these states. Several of the large rural districts

in these and other states operated mostly small schools (i.e., schools with fewer than 25 students per

elementary grade and 100 students per secondary grade), and in a sense, these “large rural districts

with a majority of small schools” also represent small rural education in America. Therefore, in

addition to the main analyses, parallel analyses were carried out for an expanded definition of small

rural district, including these districts. 

The results from the first set of parallel analyses, including the 254 large rural districts with
126

a majority of small schools in the set of small rural districts, are mentioned in footnotes at the end

of each chapter. Generally, because these districts constituted only a small fraction of the small rural

districts, nationally, there were only small differences in the findings.

Including all unified districts with fewer than 100 students per high school grade. Second,

one can argue that unified (K-12) districts with enough students to qualify as large at the elementary

level (i.e., more than 25 students per elementary grade) but not enough to qualify as large at the

secondary level (i.e., fewer than 100 students per secondary grade) should be considered small.

Therefore, a second set of parallel analyses was also carried out, including unified districts with

fewer than 100 students per secondary grade in the definition of small districts.

Counting unified districts with fewer than 100 students per secondary grade as small had a

substantial impact on results. The number of small rural districts in 1993-94 increased from 4,238

to 5,595; with this criterion, 80 percent of the regular public school districts in rural locales would

be categorized as small. Moreover, because the additional "small" rural districts had greater

enrollments than those originally counted as small, the average enrollment in small rural districts by

the expanded definition was about 440, rather than 260. There were 12,000 schools and 2,460,000

students in small rural districts in 1993-94 by the expanded definition. Between 1986-87 and 1993-

94, the overall gain in enrollment in small rural districts became 110,000 students, rather than 8,000.

The region of the country in which the percentage change in districts counted as small rural

was greatest was the Southeast, where instead of 16 small rural districts, 110 small rural districts

were counted. Across the country, more minorities were enrolled in small rural districts by the

expanded definition. For example, 4 percent of students in small rural districts were African

American, rather than 2 percent; and 18 percent of Native American students, rather than 10 percent,

were enrolled in small rural districts. 

As a general pattern, this expansion of the definition of "small" changed findings for small

rural districts by averaging characteristics of large rural districts with them. For example, small rural

districts became more like other districts in the relative frequency of unified (K-12) districts (73

percent, rather than 65 percent, compared to 76 percent in other districts). As another example, the

percentage of small rural districts' revenues from local sources shifted from 44 percent to 42 percent,

closer to the original 38 percent for large rural districts. Finally, the average student/teacher ratio

in small rural districts was shifted from 13:1 to 15:1, closer to the average of 17:1 for large rural

districts.

A noticeable shift in patterns of per-pupil revenue and expenditures resulted from the

expanded definition of small rural districts: rather than spending on average $200 more than large

nonrural districts, the larger set of small rural districts were found to spend $100 less. Although

these are not large differences, compared to the overall average of about $6,000 per pupil, the shift

is significant. Although regional variations in revenues and expenditures followed similar patterns,

the increased number of small rural districts in the Southeast provided greater assurance that the

averages are reliable. In the Southeast, per-pupil revenue and expenditures in the expanded set of

110 small rural districts averaged about $100 less than in other districts in the region, but between

1989-90 and 1992-93 there was a gain of $246 in per-pupil expenditures in small rural districts in

the Southeast.
127

Table B1. Number of small rural districts, large rural districts with a majority of small schools, and

large rural districts with small secondary enrollments in 1993-94, by state

Small rural Large rural with a majority of small schools Large Rural but Small 9-12 

50 States and D.C. 4,238 254 1,357

Alabama 0 5 0

Alaska 37 7 7

Arizona 55 4 10

Arkansas 132 3 61

California 147 16 15

Colorado 89 1 21

Connecticut 10 2 4

Delaware 0 2 0

District of Columbia 0 0 2

Florida 0 3 2

Georgia 3 1 18

Hawaii 0 0 0

Idaho 44 5 22

Illinois 203 22 83

Indiana 6 2 52

Iowa 196 5 73

Kansas 161 21 55

Kentucky 6 2 15

Louisana 0 5 0

Maine 82 0 18

Maryland 0 0 0

Massachusetts 6 1 1

Michigan 80 3 79

Minnesota 156 8 72

Mississippi 2 12 18

Missouri 253 9 86

Montana 369 1 0

Nebraska 484 3 9

Nevada 3 5 2

New Hampshire 45 2 8

New Jersey 21 1 2

New Mexico 37 1 10

New York 97 2 70

North Carolina 0 1 6

North Dakota 217 2 12

Ohio 23 9 97

Oklahoma 294 3 42

Oregon 91 2 6

Pennsylvania 5 2 33

Rhode Island 1 0 0

South Carolina 2 0 9

South Dakota 130 9 18

Tennessee 1 12 10

Texas 389 5 136

Utah 5 4 5

Vermont 141 0 3

Virginia 2 5 11

Washington 107 3 43

West Virginia 0 6 3

Wisconsin 94 30 99

Wyoming 12 7 9
128

District Grade Level: Elementary/Unified/Secondary. An elementary school district is

defined as a district that has no grade above grade 8, a secondary school district is a district that has

no grade below 7, and a combined or unified school district is a district that has some grade below

grade 7 and some grade above grade 8.

District Type. Seven types of districts are included in CCD, but analyses are limited to

“regular” districts, those of types 1 and 2. Other types of districts are omitted from the analyses,

because they are very different from other small rural districts and very few in number. These

include regional education service agencies, administrative components of supervisory unions, and

state-operated agencies. Devoting a portion of the report to their analyses would detract from the

main points of the report.

Geographical Regions.

Northeast: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York,

Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont

Midwest: Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North

Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, Wisconsin

Southeast: Alabama, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana,

Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, West

Virginia

South Central: Arkansas, Oklahoma, Texas

West: Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New

Mexico, Oregon, Utah, Washington, Wyoming

School Grade Span. School grade spans were defined slightly differently from district grade

levels. Listings of all the regular school grade ranges from the 1987 CCD indicated that there was

at least one school in nearly every possible grade span category. The classification schema below

(see figure B1) was developed to categorize every possible combination, including an intermediate

school category consistent with the philosophy of most intermediate school advocates. It includes

the following grade level categories:

1) Elementary school

2) Intermediate school

3) High school

4) Combined school

5) Ungraded or Unknown
129

Figure B1. Schema for classification of schools by grades served

PK K 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12

PK E E E E E E E E E E C C C C

K E E E E E E E E E C CCC

1 E E E E E E E E C CCC

2 E E E E E E E C CCC

3 E E E E E E C CCC

4 E E E I I I CCC

5 E E I I I CCC

6 E I I I H HH

7 I I I H HH

8 I I H HH

9 I H HH

10 H H H

11 H H

12 H

NOTE: E=Elementary; I=Intermediate; H=High; C=Combined. Low grades are on the diagonal; high grades are listed on top.

That is, an elementary school has a high grade of 6 or lower or a combination of a low grade

less than 4 and a high grade of 8 or lower; an intermediate school has a low grade of 4 or higher and

a high grade of 7, 8, or 9; a high school has a low grade of 6 or higher and a high grade of at least

10; a combined school has a low grade of 5 or lower and a high grade of at least 10, or a low grade

of 3 or lower and a high grade of 9. Other schools are classified as unknown or ungraded.

School Size. Schools were classified as “small” according to the same threshold as districts.

Small schools were schools with total enrollment less than 25 per elementary (K-8) grade served and

100 per secondary (9-12) grade served.
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School Type. The CCD type codes are used for this purpose. They are:

1) Regular school

2) Special education school

3) Vocational education school

4) Alternative education school

District Per-Pupil Revenues. Data from F-33 on revenues from local, state, and federal

sources are used. Percentages are extracted from the CCD CD-ROM or equivalent files. For CCD,

revenue is an increase in the net current assets of a government fund type from other than

expenditure refunds and residual equity transfers. Revenues are reported from local, intermediate,

state, and federal sources. Per-pupil revenues are weighted by enrollment in computing national

averages. 

District Per-Pupil Expenditures. Data from F-33 on expenditures for instruction and for

other operations are used. Percentages are extracted from the CCD CD-ROM or equivalent files.

For CCD, current expenditures include the categories of instruction, support services, and noninstructional services that include fixed charges (employee benefits, rent, interest). They do not

include debt service and capital outlay. Instructional expenditures include those for activities dealing

with the interaction between students and teachers (salaries, including sabbatical leave, employee

benefits, and purchased instructional services). Per-pupil expenditures are weighted by enrollment

in computing national averages. 

Very Small Schools. For this report, small schools with fewer than one teacher per grade

were called very small schools. 

Longitudinal Editing and Imputation of CCD Data

The Common Core of Data relies on state-level aggregation of district information and

transmission to NCES. In that process, there are occasions for errors in interpretation by respondents

and errors of data entry. It is impossible to identify many errors because the resulting figures, by

themselves, appear to be reasonable. However, when data from 8 years are merged, it is possible to

make much more precise identification of errors. For example, a district whose reported enrollment

pattern over 8 years is (375, 390, 365, 40, 415, 420, 410, 430) can be assumed to have a data entry

error in the fourth year—an enrollment of about 400 would be a reasonable estimate for that year.

In preparing this CCD longitudinal report on small rural school districts, extensive editing and

imputation were undertaken. The specific steps are described in this section. Chronologically, the

1986-87 through 1991-92 data were edited and imputed simultaneously, and the 1992-93 and 1993-

94 data were subsequently imputed using the values from the preceding years. The editing and

imputation was performed in the following 15 steps.

Step 1. Specify the records to be included. Identify school districts that change type from

regular to nonregular and back, and set the type to be constant. Reported types of some districts in

Maine, Massachusetts, California, Ohio, Virginia, and Vermont were changed in some years. (For

one LEA on the Mississippi River whose state did not match its identification code, the variable
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STATE was changed.) Also, if any district has no students, no teachers, and no schools, and does

not merge with any schools on the school file, in any year, delete it from the file. This step

determines the number of district records on each year’s file.

Step 2. YEARS. Create YEARS, a string with one character for each year: “Y” if the

district is on the district file and merges with at least one school on the school file in the year, “N”

if the district is on the district file but merges with no schools on the school file in the year, and “M”

if the district is not on the district file in the year.

Step 3. Number of schools. If the number of schools is missing for a district for a year, use

the number from a preceding year with data. If the number is not available for any year, use the

number of records on the school file for the district. (If none, set the number of schools to zero.) 

Step 4. Grade span. If high grade and low grade are missing for a year, use the previous

or closest year if some year has data. Otherwise, impute from school file. If the school file grade

span is indeterminate, but there is a school, impute KG-to-12. Otherwise (if there is no school),

impute as missing. Edit gradespans to remove cases in which low grade is higher than high

grade—set them equal to whichever is not imputed, or if neither is, to the lower of the two.

Step 5. Number of teachers. Set spurious zeros for numbers of teachers (in Massachusetts

and Michigan in 2 years) to missing. If number of teachers is missing in a district for a year, use the

sum from the school file if there is a match. Otherwise, use a prior year’s count, or if no teacher

counts are available for any year, impute a value equal to the product of the number of schools times

the number of grades in the gradespan (i.e., one teacher per school per grade). If the gradespan is

indeterminate, impute one teacher per school.

Step 6. Edit number of students. Replace zero or missing values for enrollment in a

district, or values that differ from an adjacent year by both 40 and 40 percent, with positive values

from the school file whenever available. Note that when single years were added to the file later

(i.e., 1992-93 and 1993-94), this step was repeated.

Step 7. Edit student/teacher ratio. Remove large or inconsistent student/teacher ratios

(S/T). If for some year, a district’s S/T is greater than 50 or S/T is “inconsistent” with both of the

2 adjacent years (by a factor of 2 or more), and the adjacent years are consistent with each other, then

either set S to missing (to be imputed) or impute T directly. If S is consistent with adjacent years

but T is not (each by a 40 percent factor), impute T as the average of the two years it is adjacent to.

Otherwise set S to missing. One district, new in 1991-92, has number of teachers imputed from

1992-93, because its number of teachers in 1991-1992 created a student teacher ratio greater than

700.

Step 8. Impute number of students. Run PROC IMPUTE to impute total students in the

6 years. The imputation is BY two categories of number of schools (districts with fewer than 4

schools and districts with 4 to 19 schools). No districts with more than 20 schools were missing total

enrollment. The average number of schools and average number of teachers were used in PROC

IMPUTE.
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Step 9. Racial-ethnic percentages. This step imputes ethnic distributions. First, the SDDB

(1990 decennial Census, mapped onto school district boundaries) is used to obtain percentages of

each district’s child population in different ethnic groups. For 27 districts for which no ethnic data

are available for any year on the CCD or for the SDDB, impute the average for districts in the same

city, or if not available, from the same county. For districts with data in some years but not others,

perform the edit check described below, then use PROC IMPUTE. (However, no ethnic data were

available for 1986-87, and none were imputed. Ethnic distributions for that year are not included

in the report.)

Set inconsistent values to missing. These are values for districts that have values for at least

3 different years, and at least one of the percents differs from the average of all years by both (a) at

least 25 percentage points and (b) at least 5 standard deviations. Also, for convenience, set the

percentages for districts with zero students to the national averages: 1.1, 6.1, 5.4, 2.2, 85.2, for

Asian, black non-Hispanic, Hispanic, Native American, and white non-Hispanic, respectively. Run

PROC IMPUTE with the 20 variables (four ethnic groups (excluding white non-Hispanics) for each

year from 1987-88 through 1991-92). An additional run using all years’ data, but only imputing the

last 2 years, was made to impute missing values for 1992-93 and 1993-94.

If the resulting sum of the minority percents is greater than 100 for any district, they are

normalized to 100. The white non-Hispanic percentage is set to 100 minus the sum of the other

percentages in all districts.

Step 10. Locale code. For districts with schools with locale codes, the NCES standard

procedure for deriving district locale codes from school locale codes was used. That procedure

assigns the most frequent school locale code in the district, setting ties to the more urban local, with

the possible exception that for districts in which at least three-fourths of the schools have locales

spread among values of 1, 2, 3, or 4 (i.e., in metropolitan areas) but the most frequent single school

locale is 5, 6, or 7 (i.e., large or small town or rural), the district locale would be set to the most

frequent of the values 1, 2, 3, or 4. (That exception did not occur in these data.) 

For districts with no locale code in any year, the most frequent locale code for districts in the

same county was used. If no data were available for the county, (a) the value 2 was imputed if the

metro status code was 1; otherwise, if the number of schools was less than 5, the value 7 was

imputed. If the metro status code was 2 and there were 5 or more schools, the value 3 was imputed;

and if the metro status code was 3 and there were 5 or more schools, the value 6 was imputed. These

rules are based on minimizing the percent errors based on relations observed for districts with data.

Although the locale code was imputed separately by year, imputed values for a district were forced

to be constant across years, equal either to the latest unimputed value or, if there were no unimputed

values, to the modal value. 

Step 11. Percent of school-aged children in poverty. (This variable was taken from the

SDDB. It was therefore missing for all CCD districts not present in the SDDB.) The average

percent poverty for districts in the same county was used to impute percent poverty. If there were

no districts in a county with data, the average value 17 percent was used.
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Step 12. Counts of special education students. First, counts in all districts in states which

reported uniform zeroes in a year were set to missing, to be imputed. Second, if the number in a

district exceeds the total number of students for a district, it was imputed to be equal to the total

number of students.

Counts were then translated to fractions of total enrollment, and two variables were

created—the average fractions for 1987-88 and 1988-89, and the average fractions for later years.

Two averages were used because the values in the earlier years were not highly correlated with the

values in later years. PROC IMPUTE was run, with five special education percentages (one for each

year from 1987-88 through 1991-92), the two overall averages, and the percent of enrollment that

was black non-Hispanic, plus Native American, minus Asian. It was run with separate hot deck

distributions depending on whether there was a determined gradespan. These variables were selected

on the basis of regression model results. Imputed percentages were translated back into counts.

Step 13. Four types of high school completers. Data were only available for the years after

1986-87, and the high school equivalence results were not available for 1991-92. First, values for

12th grade enrollment were imputed (and later dropped), in order to impute graduates as a ratio to

the preceding year’s 12th graders. Imputation of 12th grade enrollment occurred if the number of

12th graders was either missing, larger than the total enrollment, or less than half of the total

completers (the sum of four fields: regular diplomas, plus other diplomas, plus other high school

completers, plus high school equivalencies). 

If the grade span was reasonable, the value of the total enrollment divided by the number of

grades was used for 12th grade enrollment. Otherwise, if there was a 12th grade and the number of

completers was greater than zero, the grade 12 enrollment was set equal to the completers. If 12th

grade was not offered or the number of completers was zero, count of 12th graders was imputed to

be zero.

A small number of erroneous values for high grade in 1986-87 were set to 12. These were

cases in which there were 12th graders enrolled and completers the next year but for which high

grade was less than 12. Counts of completers were transformed to ratios to preceding years’ 12th

graders.

PROC IMPUTE was run after the file was prepared. Variables included were average ethnic

percentages and percent in poverty, as well as the average over years of each of the four categories

of completers. The latter averages, which normally would be no greater than 1, unless there was

substantial in-migration, were not allowed to exceed 2. Values of percentage of 12th graders who

earned regular diplomas that differed from the average (across years) by more than 50 percentage

points and values of other completion types that differed by more than 20 percentage points from the

average were set to missing. Hot deck distributions were selected separately for three sizes of 12th

grade cohorts: <20, 20 to 99, and 100 or more. The results were transformed back to counts, and

three districts new in 1991-92 were separately imputed to have no completers.

Step 14. All imputed counts on the file were rounded to integers.
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Step 15. Impute Per-Pupil Revenues and Expenditures. In addition to variables on the

CCD nonfiscal survey file, two variables on the F-33 Census of Governments survey, total revenues

and expenditures per pupil, were imputed for the four school years from 1989-90 through 1992-3.

For nearly every regular school district, data were present for at least one of the four years. Districts

with data in none of these years (n = 90) were imputed as the average value of per-pupil revenues

and expenditures for districts reporting data in the specified year, by category. The categories for

which separate mean values were computed in each of the four years were large and small districts

in rural and nonrural settings in each of the four standard geographic regions. (The division of the

south into two subregions used elsewhere in this report was not applied to this imputation.)

For all imputations, the first step was to compute mean values of per-pupil revenues and

expenditures for the 11,729 regular districts with F-33 data in all four of the school years (1989-90

through 1992-93). The mean values for per-pupil revenues and expenditures were obtained for each

of four regions, separately for small and large rural and nonrural districts in each year (a total of 128

numbers). Means were weighted by the F-33 estimate of enrollment in the year.

 Next, for each pair of adjacent years, a linear regression function was estimated, using a

single predictor (the same measure in the adjacent year), to predict the deviation of a district’s perpupil revenues or expenditures from the mean for that district’s region and size and locale category.

A total of 12 regressions were estimated (3 pairs of adjacent years, in each order, for revenues and

expenditures). The regressions were weighted by the F-33 estimate of enrollment in the year being

predicted. Then, for cases missing in a year, the value was imputed as the sum of (a) the mean value

for the region by size by locale category for that year and (b) the estimated deviation from the mean

based on the regression.

The percentages of data that were imputed for this report range from 0.0 percent to 47.7

percent, as shown in table B2. Except for race and special education counts in the earlier years, none

of these percentages were as great as 20 percent. Although these percentages primarily represent

missing data, some imputed values are the result of setting unreasonable reported values to missing.

As a general rule, most imputed values were based on reported values for the same district in

different years, using the rules summarized above. It should be noted that these percentages pertain

only to regular school districts, as used in this report. Between 1,000 and 2,000 other entities are

included in the Common Core of Data public school district release file. 

 

 

 
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Table B2. Percentages of values imputed on the district files used in the small rural districts report

Year

Variable 1986-87 1987-88 1988-89 1989-90 1990-91 1991-92 1992-93 1993-94 

Small rural districts

Gradespan 0.3 0.6 0.4 0.2 0.3 0.9 0.6 0.5

No. of Schools 0.0 0.3 0.2 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0

No. of Teachers 3.1 2.8 11.8 0.6 2.6 3.2 8.0 3.9

No. of Students 21.7 0.5 0.3 0.2 0.5 0.4 0.3 0.2

Race (Low/High) -- 25.-40. 22.-34. 20.-28. 14.3 8.8 4.0 1.8

Special Ed Count -- 40.7 29.7 26.0 31.3 13.3 1.8 2.6

Locale 4.3 4.0 3.1 1.8 0.9 0.2 0.0 0.0

Per-Pupil Revenue -- -- -- 3.9 26.1 1.6 15.7 --

Per-Pupil Expenditure -- -- -- 3.9 26.2 1.5 15.8 --

All districts

Gradespan 0.6 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.3 0.6 0.4 0.3

No. of Schools 0.1 0.2 0.1 0.1 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0

No. of Teachers 6.4 7.7 13.9 2.6 5.8 6.6 5.7 2.1

No. of Students 19.4 0.5 0.2 0.1 0.3 0.2 0.2 0.1

Race (Low/High) -- 26.-36. 16.-25. 12.-18. 10.9 7.6 5.1 2.4

Special Ed Count -- 47.7 35.0 23.1 30.4 15.7 10.2 6.4

Locale 3.5 3.4 2.8 1.7 1.1 0.1 0.0 0.0

Per-Pupil Revenue -- -- -- 2.9 15.7 1.3 12.6 --

Per-Pupil Expenditure -- -- -- 2.9 15.7 1.3 12.6 --

Notes: -- Indicates that the measure was not included in this report for the particular year.

 Percentages of race/ethnicity imputation, unlike other measures, are for schools.

 

 Three of the entries for race/ethnicity in table B2 represent a range. Before 1990-91, there

were different percentages of missing data for different race/ethnicities, ranging from a low for white

non-Hispanics to a high for Native Americans. District level race/ethnicity percentages were

obtained by summing the percentages for schools in the district, with appropriate weights. However,

there were a few districts with no school data. Therefore, in addition to the values imputed at the

school level shown in table B2, small percentages of race/ethnicity distributions were imputed at the

district level. These percentages were for 0.9, 1.0, 0.4, 0.5, 0.1, 0.2, and 0.3 percent of the districts

in the years from 1987-88 through 1993-94, respectively.
136