Cowboy State Education Coverage, Driven by Data
Education News & Data
Local education reporting from every corner of Wyoming, grounded in Wyoming Department of Education data.
Wyoming's enrollment peaked at 94,002 in 2016, driven by the energy boom. The state was already losing students before the pandemic arrived.
Sweetwater #1 has lost 22.1% of enrollment since its 2016 peak of 5,749 students, the steepest decline among Wyoming's mid-size and large districts.
Wyoming was among the first states to reopen schools, yet only 6 of 48 districts have returned to pre-COVID enrollment. The post-pandemic decline has been 2.7 times larger than the initial COVID drop.
Natrona County School District #1 lost 443 students in 2025-26, capping three straight years of accelerating decline that has erased 25 years of growth.
Wyoming enrolled 6,064 kindergartners in 2025-26 — 25 percent below the 2014 peak — while Grade 12 sits near an all-time high. The grade pipeline tells the next decade's story.
Laramie County School District #1, Wyoming's largest, has lost 1,402 students since 2020 and plans to close 8 elementary schools through 2035. Parents have sued to stop it.
Seventeen of Wyoming's 51 districts — 33 percent — are at their lowest enrollment in the 26-year data record, and the two largest are within striking distance.
Glendo High School enrolled one student in 2025-26. One of 19 Wyoming schools with fewer than 10, part of a rural system in the least populated state.
Wyoming lost 2,483 students in 2025-26, the largest single-year decline in the state's 26-year enrollment record, surpassing even the COVID drop.
WDE releases 2025-26 enrollment data showing Wyoming lost 2,483 students, the largest single-year decline in 26 years of records.