Fort Worth ISD hopes to regain pre-K enrollment lost last year. How close are they?
After a marathon recruiting effort that started last fall, Fort Worth ISD is waiting to see whether pre-K enrollment will rebound to pre-pandemic levels after a 1,400 student decline last year.
“I think we would be better prepared to answer that question after the first week of school,” Chief Academic Officer Jerry Moore said. “What we know, historically, is regardless of the efforts that we put out, there still are a number of students who enroll that first day or first week of school.”
The question for Fort Worth ISD, and districts across the state, is how many students that will be. Disruptions caused by the coronavirus continue this year, underscored by a new surge of the Delta variant that is putting more kids in the hospital.
There are currently no vaccines authorized for use in children under 12.
Three days before the start of school, 4,293 parents enrolled their children in pre-K, with another 418 pending application review. That number is higher than last year, showing an enrollment increase of about 700, but falling short of the 5,430 students enrolled prior to the pandemic. Both pre-K and Kindergarten are optional in Texas.
Moore said the district, which has been proactive in reaching out to parents in the community, is aiming to return to pre-pandemic enrollment levels.
“I think that’s still a realistic goal,” he said. “I think we have some work to do. But what’s more important to me is how do we reach the students that are out there in our community and make sure every family that wants a pre-K experience understands how to access that experience, and we get kids connected as early as possible.”
Enrollment and outreach efforts are continuing until the first day of school, with almost 200 students enrolling overnight Thursday, according to numbers shared by the district.
Recruitment Efforts
Olayinka Moore-Ojo, the director of Early Learning for the district, said recruitment efforts started earlier this year, and included a more personalized approach than in years past.
“We created marketing needs based specifically on specific pyramids, and schools,” Moore-Ojo said earlier this summer. “So as before we took the approach of a district-wide recruitment effort, we’ve personalized it, because each area of the district has different needs and different challenges.”
In the 2019-20 school year, 5,430 students enrolled in pre-K in FWISD, more than any other time in the last 10 years, according to Texas Education Agency data.
While the district had been declining in overall enrollment since the 2016-17 school year, pre-K enrollment had been steadily growing before the pandemic. Unlike many other districts, pre-K is available to all students who wish to enroll in the school district, not just those required under state law.
Moore-Ojo said the district saw large turnouts at community events, and steady increases in enrollment at the beginning of the summer.
Marcey Sorensen, the district’s assistant superintendent of teaching & learning, said principals have been key in connecting with families.
“You can’t underscore the importance of a principal,” she said. “In communities where our principals are hands-on-deck and engaged in the community and engaged in recruitment and being out there and being present, that is where we are seeing the highest level of return.”
The nonprofit Read Fort Worth also contributed to the expanded recruitment effort for both pre-K and Kindergarten, according to Executive Director Elizabeth Brands.
“We did that by organizing cross sector volunteers from organizations across Fort Worth, including corporate organizations, civic organizations, nonprofit organizations, staff from Fort Worth ISD and staff from Read Fort Worth,” Brands said. “We called the homes of 3,300 families in Fort Worth ISD.”
Volunteers identified what support families needed to get enrolled and then followed up with porch visits to provide literacy supplies and other resources for students.
Brands said organizations have been working together with the district to make sure families feel confident and safe about going to school in-person.
“We miss you, we welcome you back and school is the safest and most academically and developmentally appropriate place for you to learn this year,” Brands said.
Safety Concerns
Jerry Moore said that the district has worked to put parents’ minds at ease by focusing on the district’s safety precautions as school is set to begin for a second full year during a pandemic.
“There are families that choose not to send kids to pre-K,” he said. “I think that was definitely a factor that we had this past year with COVID, of parents saying, ‘This is not the type of environment I want to start my child in school in.’”
Even with surging cases, Moore said the district has refined health and safety protocols and invested in materials such as dividers “so that students can see each other, but have a divider between them to help protect.”
“Students can still work together collaboratively, even if they are socially distanced,” Moore said.
Teacher assistants will also take on expanded roles next year, allowing for more individualized attention to students and more social distancing.
In the past, the role would be primarily focused on classroom management and support. Now, the district is planning to train them to take on active direct instruction, allowing for students to get more individual attention - while also allowing for the class to be spread out.
“We’re really looking at how we are ... enhancing the training for our teacher assistants that are in our pre-K classrooms so we can have more direct instruction from those teacher assistants instead of just classroom management and support,” Moore said.
