by Dick Davison, Head of Strategy
A close look at the 2010 ISC census figures may prompt a bead of sweat to form on the brow of senior school leaders…
The Independent Schools Council’s (ISC) annual census of school numbers and fees remains the essential benchmark of the health of the independent education sector. Its near 30 year historical sequence permits confident and secure decision-making, both at the sector level and for sub-sectors within it: boarding schools, girls’ schools, and so on.
And, as my colleague Gavin Humphries noted in The mtmconsulting Independent Education Sector Report 2010, its figures demonstrate convincingly that, after a 25 year period in which prolonged steady growth was only briefly interrupted by the recession of the early 1990s, pupil numbers have stagnated for some five years now.
The 2010 ISC Census confirmed this, showing too the early effects of the latest recession with an overall drop in numbers of 0.6%. The ISC, when it published the census, very sensibly put an optimistic spin on the figures, pointing out that the total school population in the United Kingdom is continuing to fall, as it has been since the early years of the century and that, therefore, the sector’s market share is actually still rising.
But it did not attempt to disguise the fact that overall rolls for prep and junior schools have been falling more rapidly (down 2.1% from Reception to Year 6 overall) and even pre-school numbers – the engine of independent school growth in the past – are also falling.
This appeared to confirm a perception general throughout the sector that independent junior schools have been finding life tougher for some time now – since long before we found ourselves in the current financial tundra.
But look closer. As always in the ISC Census, Table 3 – the age cohort breakdown – is the most revealing. Certainly, numbers of seven, eight and nine- year-olds are well down, by between 3- 4%. But encouragingly, and perhaps in belated response to the rising birthrate, numbers of five- and six-year-olds are actually increasing, suggesting a return to more robust recruitment at these ages.
Do senior schools face a reduction in pupil numbers?
And a look at the 11-year-old cohort, the crucial recruitment year for most independent senior schools, should chill the bones of senior school marketers and registrars: down by nearly two and a half per cent. So are senior schools about to be hit by a recruitment double whammy – lower numbers coming through from prep schools and a tougher recruitment environment from outside?
mtmconsulting has worked with hundreds of schools to help them understand their potential market, their parents and how to position themselves successfully. To discuss how we might be able to help your school please contact mtm.
