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Public schools in Louisiana

666,840 pupils attended 1,308 public schools in Louisiana in 2024–25, in 189 school districts. Its districts spent $14,732 per pupil in fiscal year 2023, against $16,398 nationally.

Louisiana, 2024–25

666.8 thousand
Pupils
666,840
1.4% of the nation's public school pupils.
1,308
Public schools
Operational public schools in NCES’s 2024–25 directory.
13.7
Pupils per teacher
Over the 1,305 schools that report both counts; nationally 15.2.
146
Charter schools
14.5% of pupils.
$14,732
Spending per pupil
Current spending over fall membership, fiscal year 2023.

Louisiana over time

Louisiana's public school enrollment excluding pre-kindergarten fell by 48,886 from its peak in 2022–⁠23 to 2024–⁠25

Public school membership in Louisiana 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
Louisiana's public school enrollment excluding pre-kindergarten fell by 48,886 from its peak in 2022–23 to 2024–25. Public school membership in Louisiana 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
2014–⁠15716,800688,60028,200
2015–⁠16718,711690,26728,444
2016–⁠17716,293688,31927,974
2017–⁠18715,135687,64427,491
2018–⁠19711,783683,61928,164
2019–⁠20710,439683,45426,985
2020–⁠21693,150670,02123,129
2021–⁠22683,216658,40724,809
2022–⁠23718,145692,49525,650
2023–⁠24708,190683,25624,934
2024–⁠25666,840643,60923,231
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Louisiana's school districts spent $14,732 per pupil in fiscal year 2023, against $7,605 in 2005, in each year's dollars

Current spending per pupil in Louisiana, 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
Louisiana's school districts spent $14,732 per pupil in fiscal year 2023, against $7,605 in 2005, in each year's dollars. Current spending per pupil in Louisiana, 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$7,605717,625Provisional
FY2006$8,402648,313Provisional
FY2007$8,909674,577Provisional
FY2008$9,948678,408Provisional
FY2009$10,542682,158Provisional
FY2010$10,591690,915Provisional
FY2011$10,682696,558Provisional
FY2012$11,367701,936Provisional
FY2013$10,499710,903Provisional
FY2014$10,774711,491Provisional
FY2015$11,021716,754Provisional
FY2016$11,033718,711Provisional
FY2017$11,236716,994Provisional
FY2018$11,485715,135Provisional
FY2019$11,785711,235Final
FY2020$11,905710,439Final
FY2021$13,314691,387Final
FY2022$14,946680,845Final
FY2023$14,732718,145Provisional
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Where Louisiana’s districts got their money, fiscal year 2023

Revenue of all 200 districts in NCES’s finance file, by source. Nationally, 12.6% came from federal sources.

Local sources gave Louisiana's school districts 46.4% of their revenue in fiscal year 2023

Revenue of Louisiana'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 Louisiana's school districts 46.4% of their revenue in fiscal year 2023. Revenue of Louisiana's public school districts by source, fiscal year 2023, as a share of their total revenue.
SourceRevenueShare of revenue
Federal$2.6 billion19.5%
State$4.5 billion34.1%
Local$6.1 billion46.4%
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The largest districts in Louisiana

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.

The 10 largest public school districts in Louisiana, 2024–25
DistrictPupilsSchoolsPupils per teacherSpending per pupil, fiscal year 2023
Jefferson Parish46,7907514.4$14,155
East Baton Rouge Parish39,3208113.4$15,471
St. Tammany Parish35,9565512.8$14,823
Caddo Parish32,1655615.2$14,072
Lafayette Parish29,3964517.6$12,386
Calcasieu Parish27,8515612.1$17,724
Livingston Parish26,4994314.9$12,047
Ascension Parish23,7433213.5$14,108
Bossier Parish22,2243315.4$13,381
Rapides Parish21,3404313.6$13,720

City, suburb, town and rural schools in Louisiana

33.1% of Louisiana's public school pupils attended city schools in 2024–⁠25

Pupils in Louisiana'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
33.1% of Louisiana's public school pupils attended city schools in 2024–25. Pupils in Louisiana'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
City38229.2%220,78633.1%
Suburb28621.9%176,19026.4%
Town16812.8%69,90010.5%
Rural47236.1%199,96430.0%
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Colleges in Louisiana that take federal student aid

105 colleges in Louisiana are in NCES’s IPEDS universe for 2025–26: 31 public, 21 private nonprofit and 53 private for-profit. They enrolled 330,667 students over twelve months and awarded 23,895 bachelor’s degrees.

Louisiana elsewhere on the Factbook

  • Reported crimeCrime and justice

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

  • Most dangerous cities in LouisianaCrime 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 Louisiana 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