Slipping enrollment a new challenge for Conejo Unified

Enrollment is declining in the Conejo Valley Unified School District, a trend that is creating new challenges for administrators.

Highly respected Oak Park Unified School District noticed a drop off a couple of years ago, despite its reputation for academic excellence.

Oak Park, also in Ventura County, countered the trend with a recruitment campaign designed to attract outsiders to its stellar public schools.

Why are school districts so concerned about dropping enrollment? Money, that's why. State funding to public schools in California is based on average daily attendance. The more kids you have in class each day, the more money you get.

Logic says that a lack of students shouldn't necessarily be a hardship. Who could argue against fewer kids per classroom? And fewer students equates to greater access to books, computers and other resources, right?

Not necessarily. Steady growth meant more money. As long as the surge in enrollment wasn't excessive, a happy equilibrium existed.

Reductions in home construction and high housing costs in affluent areas like the Conejo Valley have blocked yesterday's trend of escalating enrollment.

The same phenomenon is and has occurred elsewhere in the Golden State.

It's not the first time schools have faced this predicament. In the late 1950s and early '60s, many new campuses were built to handle the baby boom generation. Years later, especially in cities, some of those schools were boarded up. Some still remain vacant.

Districts with effective administrators now have an opportunity to turn a negative into a positive. We're confident that declining enrollment can be a means to improvement. Bigger isn't always better.