Enrollment Study

Enrollment Projections and Residential Development

As work continues on the Long Range Master Plan, one of the major pieces in the planning is forecasting what enrollment will look like in the future for the Cedarburg School District. In order to create the most accurate projections, multiple sources were used to see how current enrollment will change over time and how residential development could impact the number of students in the system. In years past, the District was experiencing a stable to declining trend in enrollment, but is now anticipating steady growth as larger class sizes are coming into the lower grade levels and new residential development projects are being proposed, approved, and constructed.

The chart was created using enrollment data from prior years and applying typical grade level changes during transition from year-to-year and then adding enrollment growth due to residential development. After thoroughly investigating and researching many different factors that impact student enrollment, the District has determined that up to 360 more students could be added to the system over the next five to seven years. 

Currently, there are 16 approved subdivisions and/or residential developments within the Cedarburg School District that are in various stages of completion. There are also currently three (3) proposed developments and potentially multiple more in the works.

Within the 16 residential developments that are currently under construction, there are still 208 single-family homes and 375 multi-family units yet to be built as of March 2018. Using a ratio of 1.11 students per family home and 0.12 students per multi-family unit along with a projection for normal growth, the Cedarburg School District is expecting nearly 360 more students within the next five to seven years. Even with a more conservative approach of 0.55 students per single-family home and 0.06 students per multi-family unit along with normal projected growth, the District would still see around 220 more students in the system within the next decade. 

In an effort to predict future enrollment growth resulting from residential development, the District conducted two case studies on various developments in the area.

The Topview Trail development, which is northwest of the intersection of Wauwatosa Road and Bridge Road in the City of Cedarburg, started building in January 2007 and currently has 82 out of 85 lots filled with homes. Out of those 82 homes, 57% have at least one (1) Cedarburg School District student in the residence. With some homes having multiple students, the total number of Cedarburg School District students in the development as of the 2017-18 school year is 91 with the average number of students per household in the entire development being 1.11. Of those 91 students, 58% are in grades 4K-5 (elementary), 21% are in grades 6-8 (middle school), and 21% are in grades 9-12 (high school). 

The Woodmere Townhomes, which are just north of Pioneer Road and east of Washington Avenue, were used as a case study to find out more about the number of students living within multi-family units. During the 2017-18 school year, the District has on record 15 students living within the Woodmere Townhomes out of the 126 units in the development. Based on the number of students living within the development and the number of units, the ratio of students per multi-family unit came to 0.12. 

Based on these two case studies, the District was able to estimate what future enrollment may look like based on the number of students per home or unit and the number of developments yet to be built. 

In the late 2000s, housing development was minimal in both the City and Town of Cedarburg mainly due to the Recession. However, since the early 2010s, the number of new single-family homes being built per year has seen a sharp increase in both municipalities. With the number of available lots still available in the community and with the high demand of building a home in the Cedarburg community, the District anticipates this trend to continue over the next few years leading to an increase in the number of students in the system. 

While it is not the perfect indicator of residential development since business development and changes to home values are factored into the total, analyzing local property value trends can also give an indication of the current status of development in the area. After multiple years of significant growth in the early 2000s and then a decrease in values during the housing crisis starting in 2008 and lasting through 2012, property values have been on a steading increase over the last couple of years. In fact, 2017 experienced the largest percentage increase in property values since 2006.

Total property values are driven by both residential and business development and by reassessment of values in the area. For the distrbution of the tax levy, the Cedarburg School District uses the TIF-Out fall values each year which come from the Wisconsin Department of Revenue. The TIF-Out value excludes Tax Incermental Finacing Districts (TIF).