Miami-Dade public schools registered only 3,000 students born abroad last year, compared to the 14,000 and 22,000 that the district used to enroll each year, as revealed this week by former superintendent José Dotres in an interview with WLRN regarding the impact of immigration enforcement in classrooms in South Florida.
The decline reflects the slowdown in the arrival of immigrant families caused by federal immigration policy, actively supported by Governor Ron DeSantis.
The contrast with just three years ago is striking: in the 2022-23 school year, Miami-Dade incorporated over 22,000 immigrant children in a single year, many of whom were Cuban and concentrated in Hialeah, leading to a collapse in several schools at that time.
Now the problem is the opposite: empty classrooms and budgets in free fall. The district started the 2026-27 school year with 215,078 students in directly managed schools, compared to 230,172 the previous year, accumulating about 31,000 fewer students in two years.
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The district approved a budget of approximately $7.4 billion for 2026-27, about $100 million less than the previous year, and had already implemented an additional reduction of $89 million midway through last year. The loss of foreign students is estimated to have an impact of around $70 million.
In response, the School Board approved in June the closure of five schools and the consolidation of four others, resulting in the elimination of 168 jobs. In August, nearly 30 schools in Miami-Dade came under formal review, with 12 of them operating at 50% or less of their capacity.
In this context, Lieutenant Governor Jay Collins defended the state's immigration policy without concessions. "I will never apologize for being an American first and a Floridian first. We will ensure that funding is available," he stated to WLRN.
Collins acknowledged the decrease in undocumented students but justified it: "I understand and hear what people are saying, that we have fewer illegal immigrants in our schools. Our priority has to be towards our citizens."
Expert Alejandra Vázquez Baur, from EdTrust and co-founder of the National Newcomers Network, warned that the consequences extend beyond the immigrants themselves. "New students bring new funding to schools. This means that schools receive more resources that benefit not only those students but everyone," she noted. "Less money means fewer calculators and books, fewer extracurricular programs."
The crisis is not limited to Miami-Dade. The neighboring county of Broward is facing 61,000 vacant seats and is considering closing ten more schools after losing over 27,000 students in four years and accumulating a deficit of about 94 million dollars.
In parallel to the enrollment crisis, Collins supported the new teaching standards for the history of communism that have been in effect since this academic year for students in grades six through twelve. "We have such a rich heritage, from our Cuban Americans, our Venezuelans. People who have seen and felt the pain of socialism and communism," the lieutenant governor stated.
The Board of Governors of the state university system also approved in September the prohibition of admitting undocumented students to the 12 public universities in Florida, effective from the 2027-28 academic year, thereby closing the state's public higher education to new students without legal status.
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