Ceres Unified School District officials are still putting the numbers together but expect a slight decrease in the numbers of students attending school for the 2023-24 school year that began last week.

Students returned to school on Wednesday, Aug. 16.

The district has hired 56 new teachers and 79 classified staff members.

“We are anticipating flat or slightly declining enrollment,” said Beth Jiminez, the district’s communication specialist.

At the start of the 2022-23 school year in August 2022, Ceres Unified reported 13,910 students.

In March CUSD Supt. Denise Wickham told officials that Ceres is like other districts in California which are losing population. About four years ago CUSD started seeing numbers slip, from 924 kindergartners during the 2019-20 school year to 845 kindergartners in 2022-23.

The district projects to have 436 fewer students by the year 2023-24. Wickham stated that as a result of a loss of a substantial number of students, CUSD has been “right-sizing,” meaning “we’re not hiring as many people, we’re not hiring as many teachers.”

CUSD is the largest employer in Ceres with over 3,500 employees.