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Mapping School Choice in the Gem State

Writer's picture: ICAPICAP

The Geographic Distribution of Traditional, Charter, Magnet, and Private Schools in Idaho

Bas van Doorn February 4, 2025


Introduction

Idaho's elementary and secondary school landscape is varied, with public options including traditional, charter, and magnet schools and private schools coming in a wide range of types. In addition to these options, Idaho's students can also be homeschooled or enroll in a virtual school. A statewide perspective, though, obscures significant variation in the extent and range of choice available to parents in different parts of the state. This article maps the Gem State school universe by type, providing useful insight into where choice is plentiful and where it is absent or sparse. In addition, the piece discusses patterns in accreditation, virtual schooling, and homeschooling and it provides a searchable map that allows readers to see how many schools of different types are present in a particular area of interest.


Traditional Public Schools

Article IX of the Idaho State Constitution mandates the establishment and maintenance of a "general, uniform, and thorough" system of public education. This should mean that we see public schools all over the state, provided there's a minimal population presence. As is clear from the below map, this is indeed the case: there is public school coverage across the state, even in areas with low population density.


Idaho Traditional Public Schools (deeper orange indicates higher population density)
Idaho Traditional Public Schools (deeper orange indicates higher population density)

Charter Schools

In addition to traditional public schools, Idaho has an extensive charter school system. Charter schools are public schools dedicated to a particular mission, often substantive (e.g., STEM or the arts) or reflecting a particular pedagogical philosophy (e.g., Montessori). Unlike private schools, charters must follow all federal and state laws regarding public schools, including the administration of state-mandated assessments. Charter schools have to be approved through an application to an authorizer. As specified by the relevant Idaho Charter Law , "'[a]uthorizer' means any of the following: (a) A local board of trustees of a school district; (b) The public charter school commission; (c) An Idaho public college, university, or community college; or (d) A private, nonprofit, Idaho-based, nonsectarian college or university that is accredited by the same organization that accredits Idaho public colleges and universities." The currently existing charter schools in Idaho are all authorized by either local school boards or the Idaho Public Charter School Commission. Charter schools are operated by boards separate from local school boards.


Idaho currently has 68 physical (i.e., non-virtual) charter schools. Almost half (32) are located in either Ada County or Canyon County, with an additional 7 in Idaho Falls. As is clear from the map, there are many areas that do have population but lack charter school options. A majority of charter schools (45) offer a full complement of HS grade education (grades 9-12).


Idaho Charter Schools (deeper orange indicates higher population density)
Idaho Charter Schools (deeper orange indicates higher population density)

Magnet Schools

The third and rarest category of public school in the state is the magnet school. Like charter schools, magnet schools are distinct from traditional schools in their substantive focus and/or instruction method. Unlike charter schools, however, magnet schools are part of their local school district and, as such, governed by the local school boards that also govern traditional public schools.


Magnet schools are much less plentiful than charter schools and even more geographically concentrated. Out of all 21 magnet schools in the state, 12 are in Ada County or Canyon County, with 5 in Boise, 4 in Meridian, 2 in Eagle, and 1 in Nampa. An additional 4 are located in Coeur d'Alene, leaving 5 for the rest of the state. Fourteen of the magnet schools are elementary school grade only and only 5 offer all four high school grades.


Idaho Magnet Schools (deeper orange indicates higher population density)
Idaho Magnet Schools (deeper orange indicates higher population density)

Private Schools

There is no publicly available comprehensive list of Idaho private schools, but we can put together data from several different sources to gain a relatively complete picture. Combining the Idaho Department of Education’s most recent list of private schools with information from the U.S. Census Bureau’s Private School Universe Survey (PSS) and the Private School Review website produces a list of 112 private schools offering instruction in at least 2 grades in the 1-12 range. Out of this set of schools, 104 offer at least two grades of elementary education and 93 offer at least two grades of secondary education. Not all schools offer a full 1-6 th and/or 7-12 th education. One hundred of them offer grades 1-6, 85 offer grades 7-8, 45 offer grades 9-12, and 36 offer the full 1-12 range of grades.


Idaho Private Schools (deeper orange indicates higher population density)
Idaho Private Schools (deeper orange indicates higher population density)

Most private schools in the state are religious schools. Out of all 112 schools, 90 (80.4%) have a religious affiliation. Roman Catholic schools make up 17.9% (20) of this number, with the bulk of the remaining portion spread across various Protestant denominations. Many of the non-religious schools (8) are Montessori institutions.


Private schools are not equally distributed across counties. With 27 total, Ada County has by far the highest number of private schools, followed by Kootenai County, which has 18. Canyon County, which has a larger population than Kootenai County, has 9 private schools.


A total of 23 counties have private schools, meaning 21 counties have no private schools. Seven of the counties that have private schools do not have high school grade (Grades 9-12) private options, meaning 28 counties do not have private school options for these grades.


As with and partially because of the challenges in counting private schools, it is not easy to come up with total private school enrollment figures. Combining data from the 2021-22 PSS, Private School Review, and some additional sources produces an estimate of 17,963 private school students in schools offering grade 1-12 education. This compares to 312,643 students in the public school system, meaning that about 5.4% of grade 1-12 students are enrolled in private schools. To get a sense of over-time change, we can only turn to PSS data because it is the sole source of relevant longitudinal data.



The figure shows a significant absolute increase in private school enrollment over the last half decade or so. The most significant jump occurred in between the 2019-20 and 2021-22 school years, and it is likely the COVID-19 pandemic played a role in this. It is too early to tell whether this increase is permanent. The share of total enrollment this group of PSS schools represents also went up during this period, from 2.7% to 3.6%, suggesting that the amount of private school enrollment went up in both absolute and relative terms.


An important factor associated with the prevalence of private schools is county population size. The three largest counties by population (Ada, Canyon, and Kootenai) contain 48.2% of grade 1-12 private schools. In other words, while they represent about 7% of Idaho’s 44 counties, they have close to half of its private schools. Interestingly, though, these three counties actually have an appropriate share of private schools when accounting for population size since they contain 48.8% of the state population. Ada County’s state-high number of 27 private schools amounts to 6.47 schools per 100,000 residents. Boundary County, meanwhile, has only 4 private schools, but this translates into 33.18 schools per 100,000 residents.


Knowing the school to population ratio in an area only tells us so much, though, because schools come in many sizes. As it turns out, there is tremendous variation in private school size in Idaho: the smallest school in the database has only 2 students, while the largest has 1,110. Importantly, larger schools tend to be located in high population counties, with Ada County (3) and Canyon County (1) containing the four biggest schools (range: 761-1,110 students). This helps resolve the somewhat puzzling finding discussed above that more populous counties have fewer per capita private schools: these fewer schools have, on average, higher enrollment than schools in lower population counties.


To further illustrate this point, we can look at average number of students per school by county. Boundary County, which had the highest number of private schools per capita, has very small private schools (42.75 students per school), whereas Ada County, with its low per capita number of schools, is shown to have the biggest private schools on average (208.1 students per school).


Public versus Private Coverage

The slider map below offers a comparison between public school coverage (combining traditional, charter, and magnet schools) and private school coverage in Idaho. It highlights the fact that public schools are present throughout the state, whereas private schools are concentrated in more population-dense areas.


Public schools
Public schools
Private schools
Private schools

Accreditation

All Idaho public schools that serve grades 9-12 are required by State Board of Education rule to be accredited by Cognia . Though not required to do so, some private schools voluntarily seek out accreditation. Out of the 47 private schools that serve grades 9-12, 20 (42.6%) are accredited by Cognia.


In addition, some Idaho private schools also or exclusively seek out accreditation by one of three Christian school focused organizations: ACCS (Association of Classical Christian Schools), ACSI (Association of Christian Schools International), and WCEA (Western Catholic Education Association). The three Idaho schools that have ACCS accreditation have neither Cognia nor ACSI accreditation. Out of the 9 private schools that have ACSI accreditation, 8 also have Cognia accreditation. The two schools that have WCEA accreditation also have Cognia accreditation.


Finally, some of the state's secular private schools have sought accreditation by NWAIS , the Northwest Association of Independent Schools. Four schools have already attained this accreditation, three of which also have Cognia accreditation. Two other schools that currently do not have any accreditation have attained NWAIS accreditation candidate status, which means that they are likely to receive accreditation in the future.


In total, then, 25 (53.2%) out of 47 private schools serving grades 9-12 have some kind of accreditation.


Virtual Schools

A significant number of Idaho students attend one of the state's virtual schools. As is clear from the yellow and red areas on the heat map below, the largest number of virtual students are located in the state's population centers. However, it is equally clear from the dots all over the state that virtual schools also serve numerous students in sparsely populated areas where choice is less plentiful. The state's educational regions are color-coded from light to dark to signify lower to higher percentage of virtual schoolers. We see that region 1, comprising the northernmost portion of the state, has the highest share of virtual students relative to the total number of public school students at 11.6%. The two regions in east Idaho (5 and 6), meanwhile, have the lowest shares of virtual students at 5% and 4.9% respectively.


Virtual School Students by Educational Region
Virtual School Students by Educational Region

Homeschooling

Another alternative to traditional public schools is homeschooling. Idaho does not require parents to inform the state that they are homeschooling their kids, leaving us without an even approximate count of the homeschooled student population. As best as we can tell, homeschooling in the state, as in the country as a whole, peaked in the 2020-21 school year when a good number of parents elected to homeschool rather than send their children to school.


According to the U.S. Census Household Pulse Survey , Idaho homeschooling rates increased from 8.0% in April-May 2020 to 10.3% the following September-October, though it must be said that the confidence intervals for these estimates overlap somewhat. If there was an increase, it is hard to say whether this was entirely temporary, or whether the homeschooled population has remained at a level higher than pre-pandemic.


There are two metrics—both cited in a May 2024 Idaho Education News piece —that allow us some insight into this question. First, the Idaho Department of Education collects data on the reasons why students who leave the state’s public K-12 education system do so. These data show that more students left the public system to homeschool in 2021-22 and 2022-23 than in 2019-20, the last pre-pandemic year. Second, Idaho Department of Education data also records the annual number of homeschooled students accessing public school services and this indicator also shows an upward trend in recent years. All in all, then, homeschooling numbers appear be on the rise in the state, though the exact number of homeschoolers is hard to pin down.


Another way to place Idaho homeschooling in context is to compare it to that in other states. The map below shows 2024 homeschooling rates calculated from the most recently made available Household Pulse Survey data . According to these estimates, Idaho's homeschooling rate (9.8%) is higher than those of all neighboring states except Nevada (11.6%).


Estimated Homeschool Percentage by State
Estimated Homeschool Percentage by State

Conclusion

The maps presented here show that there are many school options available in Idaho. While traditional public schools are present almost everywhere, charter schools, magnet schools, and private schools are more scarce. For parents interested in secular private school options, there are few options, especially outside of the Treasure Valley. What is more, private schools do not necessarily cover the full 1-12 grade range, leaving many students without a private option for their full elementary and secondary education. In terms of accreditation a large minority of private schools have Cognia accreditation, some have ACSI or ACCS accreditation, and the rest have no determinable accreditation. Virtual schools serve students throughout the state, both in choice-rich and choice-scarce areas. We lack good data to investigate homeschooling patterns in the state, but the information we do have suggests homeschooling is on the rise and more prevalent here than in most surrounding states.


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