Christina School District^↗ET reported 767 more special education students in 2024-25 than in 2014-15. Its count of students not receiving special education services was 4,773 lower over the same period.

These are changes in enrollment counts, not a record of which students arrived, left or changed service status. Christina's special education share rose from 18.9% to 29.5%, a 10.6 percentage-point increase. In 2024-25, it stood 7.6 points above the statewide share. The figures describe that school year, not a current enrollment count.

Two lines, one district

Christina's published total enrollment fell from 18,360 to 14,354 between 2014-15 and 2024-25, a 21.8% decline. The count receiving special education services grew from 3,471 to 4,238, a 22.1% increase. The special education count rose in every adjacent annual comparison except 2020-21, when both the total and special education counts fell. These records do not establish what caused that exception.

Subtracting the special education count from published total enrollment gives 14,889 students in 2014-15 and 10,116 in 2024-25, a 32.1% decline. This complement declined faster than total enrollment. It does not track the movement of individual students.

The special education count increased while the rest of the enrollment count decreased. Both changes contributed arithmetically to a higher share.

A statewide pattern

Delaware's statewide special education share climbed from 15.4% to 22.0%, a 6.6 percentage-point increase over the same decade. Every share here divides a reported subgroup count by its own published total enrollment. The statewide base is the separately published state total.

Colonial^↗ET rose 11.3 points, from 18.1% to 29.4%; Red Clay^↗ET rose 10.6 points, from 12.3% to 22.9%; and Brandywine^↗ET rose 9.9 points, from 15.2% to 25.1%. Christina's 2024-25 share was the highest among the noncharter reporting districts, a comparison that includes vocational districts.

Among the 41 district-level reporting entities with published special education counts and totals, Christina ranked fifth at 29.5%. Four charter schools had higher shares: Positive Outcomes at 55.5%, Gateway at 45.2%, Great Oaks at 35.9% and Freire Charter School Wilmington at 29.9%. These are ranks of reporting entities, not shares of a combined statewide enrollment base.

What the comparison can establish

Newark Charter School^↗ET grew from 1,952 to 3,115 students over the decade. Its special education share in 2024-25 was 12.3%. Odyssey Charter School^↗ET grew from 948 to 2,375 students and reported a 15.6% share. Comparing these enrollment stocks cannot show whether their students transferred from Christina.

Christina's official school directory lists Brennen School, Delaware School for the Deaf and Networks School for Employability. Their presence provides context for the district's services. The enrollment counts used here do not isolate their contribution to Christina's special education share.

The state's economic-disadvantage reporting category accounted for 48.2% of Christina enrollment in 2014-15 and 41.4% in 2024-25. Its English learner share rose from 11.6% to 16.8%. These separate shares do not measure the overlap between categories or the costs of serving them.

The central finding is the changed composition: a larger special education count within a smaller published total. These records cannot distinguish transfers, identification changes or other reasons for that shift, and they do not measure its fiscal effect.

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