Enrollment Is Shifting. Plan Fee Revenue with Confidence.

District leaders are planning around several moving parts at once. A spring 2026 RAND survey summarized by K-12 Dive found that 54% of district leaders reported budget shortages and 36% reported declining enrollment. McKinsey projects that federal K-12 funding falls from its pandemic-era peak before modest growth returns, which makes state, local, and fee revenue more important to plan well.

Student fee revenue is a place where better data pays off quickly.

Start with actuals, not estimates

A fee forecast is only as good as last year's record. The most useful inputs are straightforward:

• What was billed, by school, grade, and fee type
• What was collected, and how quickly
• What was waived, adjusted, or refunded
• What is still outstanding, including balances for students who have withdrawn

A simple four-step planning cycle

1. Pull the district-wide view. See fees owed across every campus in one report.
2. Compare campuses. Review collections school by school to spot where payment timing differs.
3. Adjust for enrollment. Apply expected enrollment changes to per-student fees using the actuals as your baseline.
4. Track as you go. Review balances monthly so the plan stays current.

What this looks like in SchoolBanks

SchoolBanks gives finance teams a district-wide fee-owing report, campus-level financial reports, a financial audit trail, payout reconciliation, and withdrawn-student balance visibility. Most reports export to CSV, and districts can use custom export templates for recurring finance handoffs.

The result is a single, consistent record that the business office, the CFO, and the board can all work from.

Next step

Ask your team one question before budget season: how long would it take to produce last year's billed, collected, and outstanding fees for every campus? If the answer is more than an afternoon, a demo can show you a faster path. For more on collections, read When District Budgets Tighten, Every Outstanding Dollar Matters.