This post concludes the week focused on Stabilizing Enrollment and builds off of two previous entries:

• Who Do We Hold Accountable and For What?
• Why Enrollment Must Be Stabilized

Currently, our graduating senior classes are significantly larger than the incoming kindergarten cohorts. In Michigan’s school funding model, nearly $11,000 follows every student. Consequently, this trend isn’t just a demographic quirk; rather, it is a fundamental threat to the Troy School District (TSD)’s fiscal stability.

My strategy for stabilizing enrollment breaks down into three distinct areas: the Sphere of Control, the Sphere of Influence, and the Sphere of Concern.

Sphere of Control: Section 105 Policy

The most immediate lever the Board pulls is our policy regarding Section 105, or “Schools of Choice.” This is our primary Sphere of Control. Each year, the Board decides exactly how many out-of-district students to accept into specific grades. Historically, TSD has only admitted Oakland County students for Kindergarten and First Grade.

Strategic use of Section 105 is not about “filling seats” at random; it is about surgical precision. By opening seats in specific buildings where resident enrollment has dipped, we can keep those schools efficient. This allows us to maintain a full slate of specialized programs and prevents the “fixed cost penalty”—where we pay to heat, light, and staff a building that is only at 75% capacity. As your Board member, I will advocate for using this tool to balance our cohorts and ensure that every school in the district remains a vibrant, well-funded learning environment.

I would note that about ten years ago, TSD intentionally sought to phase out Section 105 before restarting the program this school year. Therefore, some of the enrollment challenges that the district is currently confronting are the direct result of policy choices made by past and current board members, including the incumbent running for re-election in November 2026. Approximately 58% of the FTE loss between 2016-17 and 2025-26 is due to the change in Section 105 policy (434 students). Had we maintained out-of-district enrollment at 2016-17 levels, TSD would have earned approximately $4.6 million more in base foundation allowance revenue in this school year.

Sphere of Influence: TSD Resident Market Share

There are two ways to increase the number of TSD resident students:

• Convince more young families to move to Troy; and
• Recruit and retain more TSD resident students.

This represents our Sphere of Influence. TSD exists in a competitive environment where other traditional public school districts, charter schools, and private schools are always vying for our students.

To stabilize enrollment, we must maximize our resident market share (the percentage of K-12 students living within TSD who attend TSD). This means doubling down on the great programs the district has to offer: highlighting our world-class STEM programs, our success in the arts, and our inclusive environment, among other virtues. We need to actively recruit and retain our own resident students by engaging with families long before their children reach kindergarten. If we increase the percentage of Troy residents who choose their local public school, we can significantly offset broader demographic declines.

The TSD FTE market share has been in steady decline over the past decade, dropping from a high of 90.4% in 2016-17 to 88.4% a decade later. If TSD had maintained an 90.4% market share, then we would have retained over 252 more TSD resident students in 2025-26, which would have partially offset the loss of 434 out-of-district students. Given that each student brought in $10,836 in per pupil foundation allowance in 2025-26, the decrease of 252 TSD resident students represents lost revenue of $2.7 million.

Sphere of Concern: Regional Demographics

Finally, we must acknowledge our Sphere of Concern: the countywide trend of aging populations and fewer young families moving into the region. These are external forces we cannot control, but we must account for them in our long-range planning.

Troy is becoming an “aging city.” As neighborhoods transition from young families to empty-nesters, the district must be proactive rather than reactive. We cannot wait for a budget crisis to realize our infrastructure no longer matches our student population. We must use data-driven projections to align our long-term facilities planning with these demographic shifts.

On several occasions, the district has publicly attributed the enrollment decline entirely to the broader population trend of a declining domestic birthrate. While that is one factor, the fact is that the number of TSD resident students in Fall 2025 was only 67 FTE lower than it was in Fall 2016.

The Path Forward

To summarize, between 2016-17 and 2025-26, the FTE decline in TSD enrollment from 12,782 to 12,040 (-742) was the combination of three factors:

• Sphere of Control: a choice by the Board to reduce the number of out-of-district students by 434 students (58% of the total FTE loss);
• Sphere of Influence: a decline in the District’s FTE TSD resident market share from 90.4% to 88.4%, which works out to about 252 fewer students (34% of the total FTE loss); and
• Sphere of Concern: a decline in the number of TSD resident students by 67 (9% of the total FTE loss).

In other words, only a small portion of the enrollment decline is due to population loss. Instead, the decline in enrollment is a direct result of Board policy and a decline in TSD resident market share over the past decade. Fortunately, both of those trends are fixable.

Stabilizing enrollment is the first pillar of my S.M.A.R.T. plan because it provides the foundation for everything else. By managing our Control over enrollment policies, expanding our Influence in the local market, and respecting the realities within our Concern, we can ensure that Troy School District remains a destination for excellence for generations to come.

At the regular board meeting on Tuesday, March 17, 2026, the the Troy School District (TSD) will present its five-year enrollment projections. These forecasts are more than just numbers; they are the fundamental blueprint for the district’s financial health, which is why I included Stabilize Enrollment as the first pillar of my S.M.A.R.T. strategic plan.

The Power of The Count: Per Pupil Funding

In Michigan, student enrollment is the primary driver of school funding. For the 2025-26 school year, TSD receives a foundation allowance of $10,836 per student. This is composed of the $10,050 state base plus $786 generated by TSD’s local hold-harmless millage.

A significant portion of TSD’s operating revenues come from the multiplication of this $10,836 allowance by the “state aid membership,” which is a weighted average of the Fall 2025 (90%) and Spring 2025 (10%) student counts. For 2025-26, this membership is approximately 12,079 students, according to TSD’s 2025-2026 State Aid Financial Status Report.

Beyond the foundation allowance, the district receives categorical grants. These are additional funds awarded based on the number of students meeting specific criteria, such as those qualifying for Special Education or At-Risk services. Unlike the foundation allowance, which provides unrestricted revenue for general operations, categorical grants are restricted, meaning they can only be used for state-mandated purposes and specific allowable expenses. Ultimately, declining enrollment reduces these other forms of revenue.

The “Aging City” Effect: From District to Neighborhoods

While the city of Troy’s total population is projected to grow slightly through 2030, the “student population centers” are shifting as different neighborhoods age at different rates.

• Shifting Demographics: Since 2010, the share of Troy’s population aged 65 and over has increased significantly, while the population under age 18 has shrunk.
• School-Level Variation: As neighborhoods transition from young families to empty-nesters, the district must continue to maintain buildings in older areas. This creates a “fixed cost penalty” where the district pays to maintain infrastructure that no longer aligns geographically with where students live.

The Replacement Gap

TSD is currently facing a “funding cliff” known as the Replacement Gap. This year’s Kindergarten class is approximately 30% smaller than last year’s 12th-grade class. Because these smaller classes are spread across 12 different elementary schools, the district cannot easily consolidate costs. Over time, these smaller cohorts will continue to accumulate and drive the projected decline in districtwide enrollment. TSD can continue to leverage incoming school-of-choice students to strategically mitigate enrollment challenges at each school. However, this strategy does not address the root causes of the problem (e.g., recruitment of young families to TSD).

The Math of Scale: Fixed vs. Variable Costs

Enrollment levels drive both revenue and expenses, but a decline in enrollment poses a unique challenge: costs do not decrease as quickly as revenue. This is the nature of the types of costs that make up a majority of TSD’s expenses:

• Variable Costs: A small portion of expenses, such as classroom materials, are linearly scalable (i.e., they can be easily adjusted based on the exact number of students).
• Quasi-Variable Costs: Most costs scale in “steps” rather than lines. For example, if a 3rd-grade classroom is at the capacity set by the TEA contract, the district cannot hire “1/29th” of a teacher to accommodate one extra student. Conversely, losing one student does not allow the district to reduce teacher salary costs.
• Fixed Costs: Many expenses remain constant regardless of enrollment. Building maintenance, utilities, and insurance costs remain the same whether a school is at 100% or 80% capacity.

The Budgetary Challenge of Non-Variable Costs

A balanced budget requires that total costs equal total revenues. While a decline in enrollment results in an immediate, linear reduction in revenues, costs cannot be easily reduced at the same rate. Furthermore, most of TSD’s budget is personnel-related (salaries, benefits, and retirement). Because most building-level staff (e.g., teachers) are quasi-variable and many others (e.g., principals and central office staff) represent fixed costs, the district cannot simply “scale down” its workforce in direct proportion to a student count decline. Managing this gap between linear revenue loss and non-linear costs is the central challenge of the upcoming budgets.

Summary

Ultimately, these enrollment projections serve as a vital early warning system for the district’s long-term fiscal health. Because school funding in Michigan is a game of “linear revenue versus non-linear costs,” a shrinking student body creates structural pressures that cannot be solved by small, incremental adjustments. As the “Replacement Gap” persists and the city’s demographics continue to shift, the district must proactively align its fixed infrastructure and quasi-variable staffing levels with this new reality. Understanding these trends now allows the Board and the community to make informed, strategic decisions that protect the quality of a Troy education while ensuring the district remains on a sustainable and balanced financial path.