Minority-majority school count in Utah edges up as Latino population grows

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KEY TAKEAWAYS

Utah has seen an increase in minority-majority schools, from 126 in the 2019-20 school year to 144 currently.
Latino growth, from 99,399 students statewide in 2019-20 to 121,088 in 2024-25, has helped motor the increase.
Granite School District has 58 minority-majority schools, more than any other, while the Ogden system is the only one in Utah with a Hispanic-majority population.

SALT LAKE CITY — Reflecting the gradual demographic shift across Utah, the state has more minority-majority schools and more Hispanic-majority schools, according to the enrollment data for the 2024-25 school year, released last Friday.

The number of public schools, not including charter schools, with minority-majority populations totals 144 for the current school year, up from 126 in the 2019-20 school year. The minority population includes Native Americans, Black, Asian, Hispanic, multiple race and Pacific Islander students. The number of schools with Hispanic-majority populations, a subset of the broader minority-majority category, now totals 75, up from 53 in 2019-20.

To be sure, non-Hispanic whites still account for the vast majority of students in public, non-charter schools statewide, 412,296 of the 585,979 total K-12 population, or 70.3%. But that's down from 432,568 of the 580,652 students in 2019-20, or 74.5% of the total, according to the data from the Utah State Board of Education.

Latinos, in particular, have been a key motor to Utah's growth, same as in the United States as a whole, according to U.S. Census Bureau data released in June. That same trend shows up in school figures. The number of Hispanic students in public, non-charter schools increased from 99,399 in 2019-20 to 121,088 in 2024-25, up 21.8%. The number of other students of color — Native American, Black, Asian, multiple race and Pacific Island students — went from 48,685 to 52,595 in the span, up 8%, while the number of non-Hispanic white students fell from 432,568 to 412,296, down 4.7%.

In fact, while the overall number of students in Utah's public schools, including charter schools, fell from 672,662 in 2023-2024 to 667,789, mainly due to a decline of about 15,000 in non-Hispanic white students, Hispanic student numbers increased by about 10,000, tempering the overall dip.

Granite, Salt Lake, Ogden school districts top the list

Of the 144 schools currently with minority-majority populations, 58 are in Granite School District followed by 21 in Salt Lake School District and 12 in Ogden School District. Next come Canyon and Provo school districts, with eight minority-majority schools each, and San Juan School District, which has a heavy population of Native American students, with seven schools. The Utah State Board of Education data identifies 882 public, non-charter K-12 schools in the state in all.

Of the 75 schools with Hispanic majorities this school year, 31 are in Granite School District followed by the Salt Lake system with 15 and the Ogden system with 10.

Four school districts have minority-majority populations. Those systems and the respective minority population shares are San Juan, 64.2%; Salt Lake, 60.6%; Ogden, 59.2%; and Granite, 55.7%. The Ogden system, with a 51.4% Latino population, is the only one in Utah with a Hispanic-majority population.

As for English-language learners, a measure of immigrants and other newcomers, the numbers have edged up slightly since 2019-20. The current figures identify 53,772 students learning the language statewide, 9.2% of the public, non-charter school population, up from 45,509 or 7.8% of the total five years ago. Currently, English-language learners account for 10% or more of the population in 274 public, non-charter schools, up from 233 in 2019-2020.

The Key Takeaways for this article were generated with the assistance of large language models and reviewed by our editorial team. The article, itself, is solely human-written.