We have estimated K-12 school enrollment using data from the march Current Population Survey.  Our most recent estimates are from the March 2009 version of the Survey.  You can find earlier estimates like these from the March 2008 version of our estimates in the report “A Portrait of Unauthorized Immigrants in the United States” (http://pewhispanic.org/reports/report.php?ReportID=107) from April 14, 2009.

 

These new estimates are consistent with figures published in our Sep 1, 2010 report, “U.S. Unauthorized Immigration Flows Are Down Sharply Since Mid-Decade” (http://pewhispanic.org/reports/report.php?ReportID=126).   

 

Nationally, about 6.2% of the 53 million K-12 students are children of unauthorized immigrants representing 3.3 million children.  (Note that these data are from the survey and include both public and private schools.  The CPS gives similar but not identical results to the administrative data collected by the Department of Education.)  Most of these children (2.3 million or 4.3% of the students) are US citizens, having been born in the US.  The remaining 1 million or 1.9% and unauthorized immigrants themselves.  Note that these figures are lower than those from the 2008 estimates, principally because of a drop in the size of the unauthorized immigrant population.

 

Texas has a higher share of students who are children of unauthorized immigrants (principally because it has a much higher share of unauthorized immigrants in its population than the national average).  About 11.5% of Texas’ 4.6 million K-12 students are children of unauthorized immigrants—a little over 500,000.  Almost 70% of these children are US citizens – about 8% of the students are US-born children of unauthorized immigrants and 3.5% are themselves unauthorized immigrants (about 150,000 unauthorized immigrant students).

 

Texas ranks 4^th in the share of K-12 students who are children of unauthorized immigrants – behind Nevada, California, & Arizona.