ANCHORAGE, Alaska — Anchorage School District reported initial enrollment numbers for fiscal-year 2026 during the Aug. 28 finance committee meeting, with more than 41,000 students counted in the first 10 days and an 838-student decline from the same period last year.

“We have, over 41,000 kids enrolled, 39,400 in brick and mortar, and 2,000 in correspondence,” said Andy Hallman, chief financial officer. Officials said intensive-needs students are tracked separately and are not included in the 838 decline figure; administration reported a gain of about 43 intensive-needs students compared with the same date last year and a net gain of about 210 correspondence students.

Why it matters: population shifts affect Average Daily Membership and state funding formulas and can change the district’s revenue by several million dollars. Administrators told the committee the August count was roughly 838 fewer than last year at the same point, while the district had projected only about a 200-student decline.

Details and next steps: district staff said year-to-date totals can change after Labor Day and throughout September and that they will model revenue implications and present refined financial impacts at a future committee meeting. Staff also said correspondence growth appears concentrated in Family Partnership and not in Frontier programs; they will survey families to better understand reasons for moves to correspondence programs and report back with grade-level and movement-pattern data if feasible.