The total number of Harvard students from pre-K through 12th grade this year is 1,098, down from last year’s 1,117. These totals include students in the Choice program, whose number remained unchanged at 57 in each year. The decrease is driven by a drop in Bromfield’s enrollment, from 684 last year to 655 this year.
Superintendent Linda Dwight reported this year’s official enrollment numbers for the Harvard public schools to the School Committee on Tuesday. The state sets Oct. 1 for an official count, because students are often still moving in or out of districts during September.
While enrollment is down at Bromfield, the numbers for Hildreth Elementary tell a different story. The numbers fluctuate from grade to grade, but overall enrollment is up from 433 last year to 443 this year. On previous occasions, Dwight has said families seem to be moving into Harvard a few years after their children start school, rather than before they enter kindergarten. The figures support that conclusion, with the most new arrivals coming in third and fourth grades.
The number of Devens students has also increased, from 85 last year to 96 this year. But the increase is smaller than expected, Dwight said, because development of the Grant Road area has been slower than predicted.
Committee member SusanMary Redinger noted that births in Harvard have also risen in the past year, with 38 already this year as compared to 35 for all of 2016, according to the town’s annual report. In recent years, kindergarten enrollments have been a little more than double the number of children born in Harvard five years earlier, so this birth rate suggests that the number of future kindergarteners will rise.
While Harvard’s overall enrollment is lower this year than last, the precipitous decline predicted in a 2012 study has not occurred. The study projected the enrollment for this year would be 1,028, some 70 students lower than it is.
