Back to School: August 2026
Back to School: August 2026
It’s back-to-school season and an estimated 54.4 million K-12 students and 5.9 million teachers are set to return to the classroom this fall. Teachers make up the majority of the more than 10 million people working in the nation’s elementary and secondary schools, which also includes principals, school bus monitors, teaching assistants and janitors.
Find a busload of Census Bureau data and back-to-school resources at the links below on education spending, school enrollment, household internet access, staying healthy at school, and more.
Key Stats
More resources from Statistics in Schools:
More Stats
Back-to-School Shopping
Source: 2023 County Business Patterns (CBP).
Source: Monthly Retail Trade Survey (MRTS), Annual Retail Trade Survey (ARTS), Service Annual Survey (SAS), and administrative records. Refer to the NAICS codes in the table above and other related codes.
Source: Quarterly Services Survey (QSS).
Source: Quarterly Financial Report (QFR).
Students
Source: Current Population Survey (CPS).
Schools
Source: Value of Construction Put in Place Survey (VIP). Under “Public Series.”
Households – Computer and Internet Use
Source: 2013-2023 American Community Survey (ACS) 1-year estimates.
Source: 2022 Local Estimates of Internet Adoption.
Spending
Colleges
Source: County Business Patterns (CBP).
Public Education Employment
Field of Degree and Educational Attainment
Source: American Community Survey (ACS) 1-year estimates.
Source: Current Population Survey (CPS), 2023 Annual Social and Economic Supplement.