Skip to content
ZipNumbers

New Castle County · Delaware

Wilmington, DE public schools

Enrollment, school count, staffing and per-pupil spending for Red Clay Consolidated School District — federal education data, not a star rating.

Yellow public school bus parked at dusk, illustrating local school district data

Quick answer

Red Clay Consolidated School District is the primary public district for Wilmington, DE. It enrolls 14,771 students in 28 schools with 1,095 full-time-equivalent teachers, and spends $20,253 per pupil, 17% above the $17,320 median across the metros covered here.

Students enrolled
14,771NCES Common Core of Data, 2021-22
Schools in the district
28Operating school count
Students per teacher
13.5Enrollment ÷ FTE teachers, not class size
Spending per pupil
$20,253Total current expenditure, FY2020

Who pays for schools in Wilmington

Where the district's money comes from, FY2020.

Local revenue
40.6%
$130,216,000
State revenue
51.7%
$165,818,000
Federal revenue
7.7%
$24,830,000

Local revenue is mostly property tax, which is why the Wilmington property tax rate and school funding move together. Of every dollar spent, about 51 cents reaches instruction — teacher salaries, benefits and classroom materials — with the rest covering transport, buildings, food service and administration.

Reading the Wilmington numbers

What the 2021-22 NCES and FY2020 Census finance numbers say about this district.

At $20,253 per pupil the district spends 17% more than the $17,320 metro median, outspending 65% of the districts covered. Instruction takes 51 cents of each dollar — $10,300 per student — with the remainder on transport, buildings, food service and administration.

Funding is split roughly evenly — 40.6% local, 51.7% state — so both the local tax base and the DE aid formula matter to what this district can spend. Federal aid is a small 7.7% of the total, so national funding changes have limited effect on this budget.

14,771 students across 28 schools averages 528 students per building, and the district is smaller than the typical district covered here (44,998 students). The 13.5:1 student-to-teacher ratio is ordinary for this set of districts (median 15.2:1). It counts all FTE teachers district-wide, so actual class sizes run higher.

What this data covers

Read this before comparing districts.

Red Clay Consolidated School District is a county-scale district, so its catchment reaches well past the Wilmington city limits and these figures describe that wider area. Independently authorised charter schools, private schools and regional vocational programs are counted separately by NCES and are not in these totals. Enrollment is the 2021-22 NCES collection; dollars are the FY2020 Census F-33 survey, the latest complete national release. The two years differ, so per-pupil spending is a stable indicator rather than a live budget line.

Other Wilmington datasets on this site.

Statewide: Delaware cities · Delaware ZIP codes · Delaware sales tax · Delaware counties

Source: NCES Common Core of Data + Census F-33, via Urban Institute Education Data · rates as published for 2021-22 / FY2020

NCES LEAID 1001300. Finance figures are Census Annual Survey of School System Finances (F-33) totals as redistributed by the Urban Institute Education Data API.