Several Washington school districts are cutting teaching and support positions for the 2026-27 school year as they close budget gaps driven by enrollment decline and costs that have outpaced state funding. The Franklin Pierce School District board voted on April 14, 2026 to eliminate 44 certified positions, 3.5 district administrator positions, and 3 assistant principal positions, and to reduce hours for other staff, saving $8.5 million in the 2026-27 budget. The superintendent said further cuts are expected when the 2027-28 budget is presented on June 16, 2026, according to the Tacoma News Tribune.
Bellingham Public Schools announced it is eliminating roughly 60 certificated full-time-equivalent positions for 2026-27, about half through attrition, to close a projected $7.5 million gap, according to the Bellingham Herald. The district attributed 22 of the reductions to lower enrollment and 15.5 to a high school schedule change from eight to seven classes per term. Cascadia Daily News reported the cuts remove certificated library media specialists, reduce counseling at elementary and middle schools, pause the fifth-grade outdoor education program, reduce Promise K early learning, and raise athletics and yearbook fees, and that the district is weighing the closure of two elementary schools because of enrollment declines.
The Port Angeles School Board voted 5-1 on May 7, 2026 to eliminate 8.1 full-time-equivalent positions, including 0.1 of a French teaching position, one maintenance position, and seven paraeducator positions, to close a projected $1.9 million shortfall, the Peninsula Daily News reported. An additional 8.3 certificated and 5.0 classified paraeducation positions were cut through attrition. The district adopted a $145 million budget for 2026-27 on August 14, 2026 and projects losing 135 students next year.
Enrollment slides statewide
Statewide enrollment fell from 1,146,882 in 2019-20 to 1,098,219 in 2025-26, a decline of 48,663 students, or 4.2 percent, according to OSPI headcount data compiled by the US School Index. The sharpest drop came in 2020-21, when enrollment fell by 53,551, followed by a partial recovery through 2024-25 and another decline of 7,165 students in 2025-26. The Seattle Times reported statewide enrollment of about 1.096 million in 2025-26, roughly 50,000 below the 2019-20 level, with private school enrollment at 83,657 and homeschool enrollment at 31,664. OSPI Superintendent Chris Reykdal attributed most of the decline to lower birthrates.
An analysis of OSPI enrollment files by the WA K12 Academic Atlas found that from 2018-19 to 2024-25, Washington public schools lost about 31,000 students, a net decline of 2.7 percent. About a fifth of districts lost more than 10 percent of their enrollment over six years. The largest raw losses were:
- Seattle: 4,121 students lost
- Evergreen/Vancouver: 3,483 students lost
- Kent: 1,936 students lost
- Issaquah: 1,757 students lost
State funding lags costs
District leaders describe a funding model that has not kept pace with inflation. Bellingham's district statement said the share of the Washington state budget going to public education has dropped from nearly 52 percent to about 43 percent over the last six years, and its 2026-27 budget projects $238.4 million in spending against $241.1 million in revenue. In Port Angeles, Superintendent Olsen reported that the district's OSPI financial-health profile score rose from 1.9 to 2.6 out of 4, while adding that enrollment remains the district's main revenue concern.
The strain shows up in state oversight as well. OSPI Chief Financial Officer T.J. Kelly told the Tacoma News Tribune that seven Washington districts are on binding conditions, up from rare occurrences before about five years ago, and he cited the inflationary environment and the lack of enrollment growth among the factors affecting districts statewide. A separate report in the Peninsula Daily News cited six districts on binding conditions plus one under enhanced oversight. An audit of Franklin Pierce published May 26, 2026 flagged concerns about the district's ability to cover its financial obligations and sustain existing services. The 2024-25 audit showed $140.8 million in revenue against $142.9 million in expenditures, with the general fund balance falling more than 69 percent over the course of 2025.
The same pattern in other states
The Washington cuts track a national pattern of enrollment-driven reductions that accelerated after federal pandemic relief funds expired in September 2024. In California, enrollment dropped 1.3 percent, or 74,961 students, in the most recent year, bringing the total to 5.7 million, according to EdSource. Los Angeles Unified issued 3,200 layoff notices in February 2026 that are expected to result in 650 actual job losses, and state officials attribute the declines to falling birthrates and reduced immigration. In Arizona, Mesa Public Schools approved eliminating 147 district-level positions and a reduction in force of 42.2 certified staff for 2025-26, citing an $18 million deficit and 1,800 fewer projected students, AZ Family reported. The district had laid off nearly 400 staff the prior year.
Leander ISD in the Austin, Texas area plans to cut more than 200 campus-level staff positions, including nearly 148 teachers, to reduce a $34.4 million budget deficit for 2025-26, per the Austin American-Statesman. The superintendent blamed state lawmakers for not increasing the basic allotment since 2019 and cited mounting inflation costs. In Iowa, 157 school districts are on the budget guarantee provision for 2025-26, up from 114 in 2019-20, and the state education department projects a 3.5 percent decline in certified enrollment between 2020 and 2030, according to The Gazette. Rough Draft Atlanta reported that Georgia schools hired 18,000 more full-time-equivalent employees, an 8 percent increase from 2019 to 2025 even as enrollment fell 1 percent, citing the Georgetown Edunomics Lab, and that multiple large districts are now cutting positions and drawing down reserves.
What the research shows
Marguerite Roza, director of the Georgetown Edunomics Lab, warned that the expiration of ESSER pandemic relief funds in September 2024 left an estimated 250,000 education jobs, about $24 billion in labor, at risk, CNBC reported. She cautioned districts against using one-time federal dollars for recurring commitments and predicted that 2025 would bring the heaviest cuts.
A CRPE analysis of Washington found that traditional public school enrollment declined 2 percent annually from September 2019 to September 2021, consistent with national trends. Private school enrollment grew 10 percent on average annually and homeschool enrollment grew 27 percent over the same period. Washington's rate of missing students, 1.5 percent of 2019-20 enrollment, was lower than the national average of 2.5 percent. The study noted limitations from disrupted data collection during the pandemic.
Nationally, K-12 enrollment declined 2.3 percent, or 1.18 million students, over the past five years, according to an EdSource report citing the Education Commission of the States, and projections call for an additional loss of 2.7 million students by 2031. All 39 states that released enrollment data for the current school year reported declines.