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Public schools in Colorado

865,055 pupils attended 1,900 public schools in Colorado in 2024–25, in 273 school districts. Its districts spent $14,803 per pupil in fiscal year 2023, against $16,398 nationally.

Colorado, 2024–25

865.1 thousand
Pupils
865,055
1.8% of the nation's public school pupils.
1,900
Public schools
Operational public schools in NCES’s 2024–25 directory.
16.4
Pupils per teacher
Over the 1,879 schools that report both counts; nationally 15.2.
260
Charter schools
15.2% of pupils.
$14,803
Spending per pupil
Current spending over fall membership, fiscal year 2023.

Colorado over time

Colorado's public school enrollment excluding pre-kindergarten fell by 45,570 from its peak in 2019–⁠20 to 2024–⁠25

Public school membership in Colorado each fall, 2014–⁠15 to 2024–⁠25: all grades, and excluding pre-kindergarten, which is the line the title reads.

Membership is the October 1 count of pupils on a school’s rolls, as the state reported it to NCES.

Every year here reports its pre-kindergarten pupils.

National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education — NCES Common Core of Data — public school membership by state, 2014–15 onwards

The figures behind this chart
Colorado's public school enrollment excluding pre-kindergarten fell by 45,570 from its peak in 2019–20 to 2024–25. Public school membership in Colorado each fall, 2014–15 to 2024–25: all grades, and excluding pre-kindergarten, which is the line the title reads.
School yearAll gradesExcluding pre-kindergartenPre-kindergarten
2014–⁠15889,006857,34331,663
2015–⁠16899,112866,88832,224
2016–⁠17905,019872,56732,452
2017–⁠18910,280877,23233,048
2018–⁠19911,536877,80833,728
2019–⁠20913,223878,79834,425
2020–⁠21883,199856,78326,416
2021–⁠22880,597849,70330,894
2022–⁠23870,871838,66632,205
2023–⁠24865,661833,61332,048
2024–⁠25865,077833,22831,849
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Colorado's school districts spent $14,803 per pupil in fiscal year 2023, against $7,745 in 2005, in each year's dollars

Current spending per pupil in Colorado, fiscal years 2005 to 2023: current spending over fall membership, summed over every district. In each year’s dollars, not adjusted for inflation.

Not adjusted for inflation: a dollar in 2005 bought more than a dollar in 2023, and this chart does not say how much more.

Each year is the release NCES has published for it: provisional for most, final for fiscal years 2019 to 2022. A final release revises the provisional one by well under 1% nationally.

National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education — NCES School District Finance Survey (F-33) — every fiscal year in the current format

The figures behind this chart
Colorado's school districts spent $14,803 per pupil in fiscal year 2023, against $7,745 in 2005, in each year's dollars. Current spending per pupil in Colorado, fiscal years 2005 to 2023: current spending over fall membership, summed over every district. In each year’s dollars, not adjusted for inflation.
Fiscal yearPer pupilPupilsRelease
FY2005$7,745765,388Provisional
FY2006$8,071779,219Provisional
FY2007$8,179792,946Provisional
FY2008$9,079801,245Provisional
FY2009$8,784818,096Provisional
FY2010$8,847831,823Provisional
FY2011$8,707842,813Provisional
FY2012$8,517853,626Provisional
FY2013$8,581862,819Provisional
FY2014$8,953876,064Provisional
FY2015$9,204888,270Provisional
FY2016$9,541895,956Provisional
FY2017$9,772902,117Provisional
FY2018$10,157907,410Provisional
FY2019$10,988908,490Final
FY2020$11,567909,819Final
FY2021$12,950877,489Final
FY2022$13,368876,012Final
FY2023$14,803866,370Provisional
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Where Colorado’s districts got their money, fiscal year 2023

Revenue of all 272 districts in NCES’s finance file, by source. Nationally, 12.6% came from federal sources.

Local sources gave Colorado's school districts 51.2% of their revenue in fiscal year 2023

Revenue of Colorado's public school districts by source, fiscal year 2023, as a share of their total revenue.

National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education — NCES School District Finance Survey (F-33) — newest fiscal year

The figures behind this chart
Local sources gave Colorado's school districts 51.2% of their revenue in fiscal year 2023. Revenue of Colorado's public school districts by source, fiscal year 2023, as a share of their total revenue.
SourceRevenueShare of revenue
Federal$1.4 billion8.9%
State$6.3 billion39.9%
Local$8.1 billion51.2%
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The largest districts in Colorado

By fall membership in 2024–25. Spending per pupil is the same district’s fiscal year 2023 figure from NCES’s finance file, where it reports one.

2 more columns on a wider screen

The 10 largest public school districts in Colorado, 2024–25
DistrictPupilsSchools
School District No. 1 in the county of Denver and State of C90,471198
Jefferson County School District No. R-173,532144
Douglas County School District No. Re 161,24388
Cherry Creek School District No. 5 in the county of Arapah51,98069
Aurora Joint District No. 28 of the counties of Adams and A38,70258
Adams 12 Five Star Schools34,46654
St. Vrain Valley School District No. Re1J31,60754
Poudre School District R-129,38152
Boulder Valley School District No. Re227,98856
El Paso County Colorado School District 4925,68931

City, suburb, town and rural schools in Colorado

41.0% of Colorado's public school pupils attended city schools in 2024–⁠25

Pupils in Colorado's operational public schools by the kind of place each school is in, 2024–⁠25: NCES's twelve locales grouped into city, suburb, town and rural.

National Center for Education Statistics, U.S. Department of Education — NCES Common Core of Data — public schools, newest full school year

The figures behind this chart
41.0% of Colorado's public school pupils attended city schools in 2024–25. Pupils in Colorado's operational public schools by the kind of place each school is in, 2024–25: NCES's twelve locales grouped into city, suburb, town and rural.
LocaleSchoolsShare of schoolsPupilsShare of pupils
City67835.7%354,92941.0%
Suburb54228.5%303,86435.1%
Town22211.7%82,8729.6%
Rural45824.1%123,39014.3%
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Colleges in Colorado that take federal student aid

81 colleges in Colorado are in NCES’s IPEDS universe for 2025–26: 32 public, 12 private nonprofit and 37 private for-profit. They enrolled 519,886 students over twelve months and awarded 36,964 bachelor’s degrees.

Colorado elsewhere on the Factbook

  • Reported crimeCrime and justice

    Offenses reported to police by type, the trend, and the reporting coverage.

  • Most dangerous cities in ColoradoCrime and justice

    What each agency serving 25,000 or more reported, ranked. Agency populations overlap, so these do not add up to the state.

  • Prison populationCrime and justice

    People held under the state’s correctional authority, and the imprisonment rate. A different publisher counting a different thing.

  • Arrests by race, sex and ageCrime and justice

    Arrests as the FBI’s participating agencies reported them, with what the figures can and cannot support at the top.

  • Hate crimeCrime and justice

    Incidents reported to the FBI by bias motivation, as counts — the collection publishes no participation share, so there is no rate to compare states on.

  • Federal obligationsFederal spending

    What federal agencies obligated against a place of performance in the state, per resident and by agency.

  • Registered nonprofitsNonprofits

    How many organizations the IRS lists in the state, what they report as revenue, and which kinds of work they do.

  • Payments to doctorsHealth

    What drug and device companies reported paying doctors with a practice address in the state, and the largest recipients.

  • Immigration courtsImmigration and the border

    The EOIR courts sitting in the state, what they completed and still have pending, and how far apart their asylum grant rates are. The courts, not the state’s residents: a detention court hears cases from far outside it.

  • Farm program paymentsFarm subsidies

    What the Farm Service Agency paid through the state’s county offices, by program and by recipient. The offices that administered the payments, not a count of farms: a recipient addressed elsewhere is counted where they were paid.

  • Paycheck Protection Program loansPPP loans

    The PPP loans SBA guaranteed to businesses operating in the state, by county, with how many carry a forgiveness amount and how many were charged off. Loans, not businesses: a business with two draws is two loans.

  • Federal civilian workforceFederal salaries

    Federal civilian employees stationed in the state by agency and occupation, with the pay OPM publishes and the share it withholds.

  • The Colorado Factbook entryAcross the Factbook

    Every measure the Factbook publishes for this state in one place, each with where it ranks among the others and the record it came from.

The immigration link above is EOIR’s courts, which sit in this state. CBP’s encounters are not by state and will not be: its sectors and field offices are areas of responsibility rather than a geography, and assigning them to states would be a claim the data does not make. Immigration and the border.

Sources

SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, Common Core of Data (CCD), 2024–25; “School District Finance Survey (F-33),” fiscal year 2023; Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS).

Data retrieved