Back to School

As schools open for the fall, the Census Bureau offers some relevant data:

• 79 million  The number of children and adults enrolled in school throughout the country in October 2010 & from nursery school to college. They comprised 27 percent of the entire population age 3 and older. Source: U.S. Census Bureau, School Enrollment - Social and Economic Characteristics of Students: October 2010, Table 1 <http://www.census.gov/hhes/school/data/cps/2010/tables.html>
• 24% Percentage of elementary through high school students who had at least one foreign-born parent in October 2010. Source: U.S. Census Bureau, School Enrollment - Social and Economic Characteristics of Students: October 2010, Table 1 <http://www.census.gov/hhes/school/data/cps/2010/tables.html>
• 11.8 million Number of school-age children (5 to 17) who spoke a language other than English at home in 2010; 8.5 million of these children spoke Spanish at home. Source: U.S. Census Bureau, 2010 American Community Survey <http://factfinder2.census.gov/bkmk/table/1.0/en/ACS/10_1YR/B16004>
• 16% Percentage of all college students 35 and older in October 2010. They made up 34 percent of those attending school part time. Source: U.S. Census Bureau, School Enrollment - Social and Economic Characteristics of Students: October 2010, Table <http://www.census.gov/hhes/school/data/cps/2010/tables.html>
• 41% Percentage of 18- to 24-year-olds enrolled in college in 2010. Source: U.S. Census Bureau, School Enrollment - Social and Economic Characteristics of Students: October 2010, Table 1 <http://www.census.gov/hhes/school/data/cps/2010/tables.html>
• 56% Percent of college students who were women in 2010 (includes both undergraduate and graduate students). Source: U.S. Census Bureau, School Enrollment - Social and Economic Characteristics of Students: October 2010, Table 1 <http://www.census.gov/hhes/school/data/cps/2010/tables.html>
• $74,000 Median earnings of full-time, year-round workers with an advanced degree in 2009. Workers whose highest degree was a bachelor's had median earnings of $56,000. Median earnings for full-time, year-round workers with a high school diploma was $33,000, while workers with less than high school diploma had $25,000 median earnings. Source: Educational Attainment in the United States: 2009 <http://www.census.gov/prod/2012pubs/p20-566.pdf>