Who cares? Probably no one. I'm fiddling with school district poverty data and got curious, so I suppose I care just a little, enough to post it here. So allow me to
(oh, also this great new ProPublica database may help you understand why the number and types of school districts might possibly be important)
There are 3,144 counties (or county equivalents) in the U.S. and of these, 2,195 have more than one district. Or to put it another way, 949 (or about 30 percent) have a single district. These are mostly rural counties, of course, and the data excludes private schools.
Where I live, in Georgia, there are 159 counties and 193 school districts, thus a few counties clearly have multiple districts. DeKalb has three, which you might expect given it's in Atlanta, but so does little Jackson County (and a few others, like Hall and Carroll counties). Many have two. Most have one. It's Georgia, after all.
None of this gets at the poverty numbers. That's another challenge for another day.
UPDATE
If you see the comments below, someone pointed out an interesting point that my numbers are off. I'm headed out the door and won't have access to the data for a bit, but if it'll work I'll list below all the school districts listed in the federal database (193 districts). I see at least one repeat for some reason (Vidalia in there twice, but two different counties, Montgomery and Toombs). Atlanta City is in there twice. Here's the list below. The Georgia DOE says there's 181. I'll need to do some cleaning.
| 1 | Appling County School District |
| 2 | Atkinson County School District |
| 3 | Atlanta City School District |
| 4 | Atlanta City School District |
| 5 | Bacon County School District |
| 6 | Baker County School District |
| 7 | Baldwin County School District |
| 8 | Banks County School District |
| 9 | Barrow County School District |
| 10 | Bartow County School District |
| 11 | Ben Hill County School District |
| 12 | Berrien County School District |
| 13 | Bibb County School District |
| 14 | Bleckley County School District |
| 15 | Brantley County School District |
| 16 | Bremen City School District |
| 17 | Bremen City School District |
| 18 | Brooks County School District |
| 19 | Bryan County School District |
| 20 | Buford City School District |
| 21 | Buford City School District |
| 22 | Bulloch County School District |
| 23 | Burke County School District |
| 24 | Butts County School District |
| 25 | Calhoun City School District |
| 26 | Calhoun County School District |
| 27 | Camden County School District |
| 28 | Candler County School District |
| 29 | Carroll County School District |
| 30 | Carrollton City School District |
| 31 | Cartersville City School District |
| 32 | Catoosa County School District |
| 33 | Charlton County School District |
| 34 | Chatham County School District |
| 35 | Chattahoochee County School District |
| 36 | Chattooga County School District |
| 37 | Cherokee County School District |
| 38 | Chickamauga City School District |
| 39 | Clarke County School District |
| 40 | Clay County School District |
| 41 | Clayton County School District |
| 42 | Clinch County School District |
| 43 | Cobb County School District |
| 44 | Coffee County School District |
| 45 | Colquitt County School District |
| 46 | Columbia County School District |
| 47 | Commerce City School District |
| 48 | Cook County School District |
| 49 | Coweta County School District |
| 50 | Crawford County School District |
| 51 | Crisp County School District |
| 52 | Dade County School District |
| 53 | Dalton City School District |
| 54 | Dawson County School District |
| 55 | DeKalb County School District |
| 56 | Decatur City School District |
| 57 | Decatur County School District |
| 58 | Dodge County School District |
| 59 | Dooly County School District |
| 60 | Dougherty School District |
| 61 | Douglas County School District |
| 62 | Dublin City School District |
| 63 | Early County School District |
| 64 | Echols County School District |
| 65 | Effingham County School District |
| 66 | Elbert County School District |
| 67 | Emanuel County School District |
| 68 | Evans County School District |
| 69 | Fannin County School District |
| 70 | Fayette County School District |
| 71 | Floyd County School District |
| 72 | Forsyth County School District |
| 73 | Fort Benning Schools |
| 74 | Fort Benning Schools |
| 75 | Fort Stewart School District |
| 76 | Fort Stewart School District |
| 77 | Fort Stewart School District |
| 78 | Fort Stewart School District |
| 79 | Fort Stewart School District |
| 80 | Franklin County School District |
| 81 | Fulton County School District |
| 82 | Gainesville City School District |
| 83 | Gilmer County School District |
| 84 | Glascock County School District |
| 85 | Glynn County School District |
| 86 | Gordon County School District |
| 87 | Grady County School District |
| 88 | Greene County School District |
| 89 | Gwinnett County School District |
| 90 | Habersham County School District |
| 91 | Hall County School District |
| 92 | Hancock County School District |
| 93 | Haralson County School District |
| 94 | Harris County School District |
| 95 | Hart County School District |
| 96 | Heard County School District |
| 97 | Henry County School District |
| 98 | Houston County School District |
| 99 | Irwin County School District |
| 100 | Jackson County School District |
| 101 | Jasper County School District |
| 102 | Jeff Davis County School District |
| 103 | Jefferson City School District |
| 104 | Jefferson County School District |
| 105 | Jenkins County School District |
| 106 | Johnson County School District |
| 107 | Jones County School District |
| 108 | Lamar County School District |
| 109 | Lanier County School District |
| 110 | Laurens County School District |
| 111 | Lee County School District |
| 112 | Liberty County School District |
| 113 | Lincoln County School District |
| 114 | Long County School District |
| 115 | Lowndes County School District |
| 116 | Lumpkin County School District |
| 117 | Macon County School District |
| 118 | Madison County School District |
| 119 | Marietta City School District |
| 120 | Marion County School District |
| 121 | Mcduffie County School District |
| 122 | Mcintosh County School District |
| 123 | Meriwether County School District |
| 124 | Miller County School District |
| 125 | Mitchell County School District |
| 126 | Monroe County School District |
| 127 | Montgomery County School District |
| 128 | Morgan County School District |
| 129 | Murray County School District |
| 130 | Muscogee County School District |
| 131 | Newton County School District |
| 132 | Oconee County School District |
| 133 | Oglethorpe County School District |
| 134 | Paulding County School District |
| 135 | Peach County School District |
| 136 | Pelham City School District |
| 137 | Pickens County School District |
| 138 | Pierce County School District |
| 139 | Pike County School District |
| 140 | Polk County School District |
| 141 | Pulaski County School District |
| 142 | Putnam County School District |
| 143 | Quitman County School District |
| 144 | Rabun County School District |
| 145 | Randolph County School District |
| 146 | Richmond County School District |
| 147 | Robins AFB School District |
| 148 | Rockdale County School District |
| 149 | Rome City School District |
| 150 | Schley County School District |
| 151 | Screven County School District |
| 152 | Seminole County School District |
| 153 | Social Circle City School District |
| 154 | Social Circle City School District |
| 155 | Spalding County School District |
| 156 | Stephens County School District |
| 157 | Stewart County School District |
| 158 | Sumter County School District |
| 159 | Talbot County School District |
| 160 | Taliaferro County School District |
| 161 | Tattnall County School District |
| 162 | Taylor County School District |
| 163 | Telfair County School District |
| 164 | Terrell County School District |
| 165 | Thomas County School District |
| 166 | Thomasville City School District |
| 167 | Tift County School District |
| 168 | Toombs County School District |
| 169 | Towns County School District |
| 170 | Treutlen County School District |
| 171 | Trion City School District |
| 172 | Troup County School District |
| 173 | Turner County School District |
| 174 | Twiggs County School District |
| 175 | Union County School District |
| 176 | Upson County School District |
| 177 | Valdosta City School District |
| 178 | Vidalia City School District |
| 179 | Vidalia City School District |
| 180 | Walker County School District |
| 181 | Walton County School District |
| 182 | Ware County School District |
| 183 | Warren County School District |
| 184 | Washington County School District |
| 185 | Wayne County School District |
| 186 | Webster County School District |
| 187 | Wheeler County School District |
| 188 | White County School District |
| 189 | Whitfield County School District |
| 190 | Wilcox County School District |
| 191 | Wilkes County School District |
| 192 | Wilkinson County School District |
| 193 | Worth County School District |
2 comments:
Georgia's limits the number of school districts in the state to 180. I'm not sure where the 193 figure comes from.
Sources:
http://www.ajc.com/weblogs/get-schooled/2013/dec/30/should-georgia-change-its-constitution-allow-dunwo/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_school_districts_in_Georgia_(U.S._state)
http://gbpi.org/the-schoolhouse-squeeze-2014
Possibly I screwed up the analysis. Federal data from 2014 (downloaded today) shows 193. I saw your comment and separated Georgia data and ran it again on a separate sheet rather than creating tables and the number comes out the same. If possible, I'll list them at the bottom of the blog post with an explanation.
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