The Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) board of education approved a resolution by member Mónica Ratliff to survey families that have left the district to better understand causes for declining enrollment.

Specifically, the resolution calls for non-school based staff to conduct the survey at high-performing schools.

“In order to bring families and students back to L.A. Unified, we must know why they leave,” Ratliff said. “This survey will help us gather the data we need to better serve families and students so we can keep them in L.A. Unified.”

The resolution cites the 2015 Independent Financial Review Panel, which highlighted declining enrollment as a major challenge to the future fiscal health of the district. The report projects that LAUSD will continue to lose students at a rate of about 2.8 percent per year and concludes that “if declining enrollment cannot be reversed, the district’s future planning will be characterized by constant downsizing and loss of revenue.”

The superintendent will report back to the board with the results of the survey by Oct. 18.