Secondary school population to grow 14.7 per cent by 2027
According to the Department for Education’s latest forecasts, the population boom in the early 2000s means that the number of pupils in English secondary schools is projected to reach 3,267,000 in 2027, which 418,000 higher than it was in 2018, and an increase of 14.7 per cent.
In 2018 the overall number of pupils in secondary school increased by 1.9 per cent compared to 2017, reaching 2,849,000. This is lower than the rate of increase forecast in the previous projections (2.4 per cent). However, the rate of increase is expected to reach around 3.1 per cent for the next two years before slowly dropping to 0 per cent by the end of the projection period (2027).
It is a different picture for primary schools however. The annual rate of increase is expected to fall gradually to 0 per cent for 2020 and 2021 before decreases are projected (between 0.3 per cent and 0.7 per cent each year) until the end of the projection period. This is primarily due to the lower birth projections.
The overall population in state-funded primary schools was 4,607,000 in 2018 and is projected to be 112,000 lower in 2027 at 4,494,000.
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