Editor’s note: This is the second in a two-part series about Austin Public School’s increasing enrollment.

Austin Public Schools’ increasing enrollment is no surprise to demographers, who see plenty of signs that foretell growth. What’s surprising to everyone is the rate at which Austin enrollment is growing, which makes it unique amongst school districts and communities in southern Minnesota.

“Typically what you hear about outstate districts is they’re decreasing in enrollments,” said Mark Stotts, Austin Public School’s director of finance and operations. “To me, it was a pleasant surprise.”

Austin and Mower County are defying a decades-long outstate population decrease because of the food processing jobs, according to demographers. Mower County’s population increased from 38,603 in 2000 to 39,163 in 2010. Austin grew more dramatically, from 23,319 to 24,718 residents in that same time period.

Most rural communities are losing younger generations to urban settings. Yet cities with food processing jobs, like Austin, Worthington and Willmar, are growing, partly due to a large influx of Hispanic workers.

Austin’s Hispanic population has more than doubled over the past 10 years, from about 1,400 to almost 3,800. That mirrors a statewide trend.

“This is largely people moving here from other countries and other places in the country,” state Demographer Tom Gillaspy said in March.

Incoming workers, who are typically younger and willing to take blue collar jobs that other youths won’t, are increasing population in food processing communities like Austin.

That trend plays out in Austin’s public school enrollments, as Hispanic kindergartners make up 42 percent of Woodson’s students this year, and students of color are projected to be nearly 40 percent of Austin’s total enrollment by 2015.

“You can literally see the difference if you went to the high school than if you went to the elementary school,” said Hazel Reinhardt, the demographer who put together last year’s report on Austin’s increasing enrollment.

“The numbers bear that out. It’s a reflection of growth of who’s holding certain kinds of jobs in Austin,” Hazel added.

Pockets of population growth also often bring economic growth to rural communities. Several corporations have announced plans to begin operating in Austin in recent months, from the Caribou Coffee addition at the HyVee gas station to the Pizza Ranch restaurant in the old CashWise building. Verizon Wireless recently moved from its small storefront in the business front near Target to a larger store across the parking lot next to 18th Street NW.

Almost every educator will say students follow the economy.

“Oh yeah, there’s no doubt about that,” said John Landgaard, superintendent of Worthington Public Schools. “People have to go where the jobs are.”

Updating vs. increasing

Austin is unusual not only in that it is growing, but also because of its current population. “Minnesota really doesn’t have that many communities the size of Austin,” Reinhardt said. “There are many, many much smaller, but Minnesota doesn’t have many communities in this size class.”

That makes it harder to compare Austin’s population and enrollment trends to other communities. One, however, is clear: Austin is one of the few districts interested in building a new school because of increasing enrollment. Although several southern Minnesota school districts have completed new schools in recent years, there are few if any that built new buildings to house more students.

Chatfield Public Schools’ 2009 elementary building, for example, wasn’t built because of growing enrollment. Chatfield enrollment decreased from about 919 in 2001 to about 882 students this year, according to reports filed with the Minnesota Department of Education. The new Chatfield Elementary School replaced an old building which was built in 1918 and last renovated in 1954.

“It had been in service for a long, long time,” said Ed Harris, Chatfield Superintendent. “It was obvious from a condition point of view. It was never about space, it was about reasonable quality of space.”

Enrollment is increasing at Worthington Public Schools, although not as significantly as in Austin. The district isn’t considering building a new school any time soon, according to Superintendent John Landgaard. The newest school in Worthington, Prairie Elementary, was built to consolidate two old elementaries and can house up to 1,150 students. This year, 1,004 students attended Prairie Elementary.

Worthington has its own share of space issues, as teachers at the high school have begun pod teaching this year, which means classrooms are shared between teachers traveling with carts of classroom materials between periods.

“(It’s) just to create a little more classroom space for us,” Landgaard said.

That’s why the enrollment report which shows an increased birth rate in Austin and Mower County has district officials here concerned. Stotts hadn’t realized how high the numbers would be when he commissioned the report in 2009, his first year with the district. Construction of an addition at Ellis Middle School, already on the drawing board, made him curious about what other measures might be needed to house students.

“Really, up until that point in time, I think (district officials) had a general sense that enrollments were going to continue to increase, but they didn’t really have any concrete projections,” Stotts said. “I thought it was important that we get some kind of idea.

“That really allows you to develop a long-range facilities plan, and that’s what we’re trying to do here. You can’t just look at a two-year time period and plan for two years.”

District officials are confident there will be more than enough students for a new school. There’s plenty of stories of districts that weren’t so confident, however.

New Prague Area Schools built Raven Stream Elementary School and Eagle View Elementary School in 2006, before the housing market went under due to sub-prime mortgages. New Prague, a few miles south of the Twin Cities metropolitan area, was considered a bedroom community and a growing housing market according to Dan Pyan, Winona Public Schools director of finance.

Pyan, who worked in New Prague at the time, said the schools didn’t fill enough after the recession hit because the housing market went away and not enough people were moving in the area.

“We actually grew too fast,” he said. “We didn’t fill the building as fast as we thought they would, and that causes inefficiencies too.”

Stotts said the problem with New Prague was the district’s reliance on incoming students who would transfer from other districts, instead of the increasing birth rates evident in Austin. Since the incoming students are already in the Austin district, Stotts and district officials are sure of the wave of students rushing into Austin’s schools.

“It isn’t something we take lightly,” Stotts said. “There’s no way I’d want to make a recommendation to the school board that we build a new building if we weren’t certain about enrollment.”