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I crave data even more when it’s hard to sleep. I was looking at high school enrollment comparisons from 2024 to 2025, and you can see the Northern Lakes Conference (NLC) school enrollments will be affected by the smaller classroom sizes among grades 9 through 12(recession babies, a consequence of lower area childbirths between 2008 and 2013).
The NLC towns affected by enrollment reductions in terms of highest percentage decreases are:
Goshen (15.7%; 315 kids), Mishawaka (7.7%; 109 kids), Wawasee (6.93%; 62 kids), and Northridge (4.95%; 69 kids). Those class sizes will get even smaller as freshmen with birthdates among 2011 through 2013 launch their freshman years as the classes of 2028, 2029, and 2030, respectively.
Total high school four-grade enrollment for all NLC schools dropped by 5.47% (628 students).
Those percentage changes in enrollment among the aforementioned schools is pretty high.
Imagine if Warsaw’s enrollment dropped 7% (over 140 kids) year after year. Warsaw’s enrollment, instead, was reduced 1.9% (40 kids); not bad since the town weathered the recession anchored heavily by the biotech/orthopedic industries instead of being dependent on durable goods, manufactured goods supporting the auto, RV, and manufactured housing industries.
Goshen went from barreling toward a 2,000-student enrollment in the previous school year to fall back to a headcount of 1,691 this most recently completed school year. Concord moved up to the second largest high school in the NLC.
The most severe enrollment dips are among schools whose cities and towns were affected the most severely by the recession years between 2008 and 2013.
NorthWood, based on DOE enrollment numbers, maintained its exact enrollment of 869 students year over year. Wawasee is now the smallest NLC school with 833 students.
Some schools don’t appear to be affected so much by industry dips 12-17 years ago, but instead, their enrollment dips because of their proximity to a burgeoning, modern district with improved (and impressive) facilities a district like Columbia City offers.
Columbia City, almost equidistant from Warsaw and Fort Wayne, is a perfect bedroom community for those working in the aforementioned cities. Columbia City’s Eagle Tech contributes to the school’s enrollment - like many of the larger area schools – because they responded to the demand for education among trades, community service jobs, and other jobs greatly in demand.
Warsaw’s career center is often mentioned in a football Tiger Talk interview as more athletes are not just drawn to firefighting, and welding classes, but they are looking at postsecondary educational opportunities to hone the skills learned from these classes.
I heard, in particular, many senior Tiger gridders tell Roger Grossman they’re looking for a welding school after graduation.
Whitko, a school five years ago with around 100 kids in each of its graduating classes, dipped from 417 students in 2020 to 338 this year. The district’s enrollment dip from 389 to 338 (13.11%) is also pretty daunting.
Aside from Triton, Whitko is the only area public high school where all four high school grade levels had less than 100 students.
“Hey, this is a sports column so why are we headed down this rabbit hole this morning,” you ask?
Keep an eye on the sports among the schools with the largest dips to see how much depth they have in football, soccer, and track and field.
Enrollment decline alone certainly doesn’t mean a certain athletic program won’t suffer. Look at NorthWood. This year it was finally not the smallest school in the NLC, but their sports programs thrive in the conference and in the Class 3A enrollment tournament structure.
Mishawaka’s eye-opening 109-student dip will not affect football. The 2025 Cavemen return more than half of their skill position players and continue to reload their offensive and defensive lines.
While Argos alum might disagree about the enrollment issue, remember, the best athletes’ most attractive fall sport is soccer because they do not have football, and soccer tradition at the school is rich. The students who play soccer likely comprise a greater percentage of total enrollment because of the school’s soccer tradition.
For Warsaw’s football program, it appears the school will likely remain in IHSAA Class 5A solely on enrollment unless it wins another semistate title in football this November (to earn 6 points for a tournament success factor [TSF] bump-up). Decatur Central’s bump up (2023 state runner up, 2024 state champion) resulted from 7 TSF points. Fort Wayne Snider remains in Class 6A (TSF).
Finally, to the area graduates, best wishes in all of your future endeavors.
