The gist
The U.S. Census Bureau on Dec. 12 released new five-year data for 2023 as part of its American Community Survey, or ACS.
Friendswood, Manvel and Pearland all saw increases in their respective populations, the 2023 survey results show. Following that trend, the number of residents holding a degree for some level of higher education has increased.
The new data represents a five-year estimate of the population across the country from 2019 to 2023, according to the bureau website. This data compares with the 2018 survey results, which studied the country from 2014 to 2018.
Friendswood saw the percentage of people age 25 and older holding just a bachelor’s degree, as well as the total number, decline, data shows. Despite this, the percentage of people with a graduate or professional degree increased by nearly 22% compared to the 2018 survey.
That brought the total percentage of people age 25 and up with a bachelor’s degree or higher to just shy of 50%, totaling around 13,000 people, according to the data. Of the three cities in the 2023 survey, Friendswood had the highest percentage in this category.
Diving in deeper
While both Pearland and Manvel saw overall increases in the number of people with some level of higher education, the overall percentage changes varied, according to the data.
Pearland, for example, saw the portion of residents age 25 and over with an associate degree and graduate or professional degree drop by a few percentage points, data shows. The number of people with some college but no degree also dropped in both overall percentage of the population as well as total number of people in the city.
Manvel had a decrease in the percentage of people with just an associate degrees in the 2023 survey compared to 2018, according to the data. However, the share of people age 25 and over with a graduate or professional degree almost doubled as a share of the population to 14%. The total number of people with a graduate or professional degree, due in part to Manvel’s growth, went up by over 200%.
Despite declines for Pearland in certain areas, the number of people with a bachelor’s degree increased by more than 12% across the entire population, according to the data. The percentage of people age 25 and over with a bachelor’s degree or higher hit 47.4% in the 2023 survey, which is up from 46.2% in 2018.
Residents ages 25 and over in Manvel with a bachelor’s degree stayed flat as a percentage of the population but increased by nearly 800 people in total, data shows. For that age group, the total number of people with a bachelor’s degree or higher nearly doubled and went from 30.9% of the population in 2018 to 37.8% in the 2023 survey.
Also of note
All three cities had a larger portion of residents ages 18-24 have less than a high school diploma in 2023 compared to the survey results in 2018, according to the data.
Friendswood saw 21.7% of its population ages 18-24 have less than a high school diploma compared to 19.8% in 2018, data shows. In Pearland those figures went from 10.6% to 12%. In Manvel, which saw the largest change, that percentage went from 2.6% in 2018 to 19.8% in 2023.
The results were more mixed for residents age 25 and over, according to the data. Whereas Pearland saw about 5% of its population in that age range report less than a high school diploma as their highest form of education, which was down from 5.5% in 2018, Friendswood went from 3.9% in 2018 to 4.9% in 2023.
Manvel, which again had the largest change of the group, went from 6.1% of residents age 25 and over without a high school diploma in the 2018 survey results to 12.4% in 2023, according to the data.
Manvel and Pearland also had a larger portion of residents overall have a high school diploma or equivalent as their highest form of education, while Friendswood saw a decline, according to the data.
What else?
In Pearland and Manvel, a higher portion of female residents had at least a bachelor’s degree compared to male residents, data shows. This was true in the survey results from 2023, 2018 and 2013.
The 2023 results for Pearland showed a majority of female residents age 25 and up held at least a bachelor’s degree, according to the data.
Friendswood in 2018 saw a majority of male residents, 52.9%, age 25 and over hold a bachelor’s degree or higher compared to 43.3% of female residents of the same age range. The same was the case for Friendswood in 2013, according to the data.
In 2023, half of female residents ages 25 and up in Friendswood had a bachelor’s degree or higher compared to 49.1% of male residents, data shows.
For those ages 18-24, a higher portion of female residents in all three cities dating back to 2013 had a bachelor’s degree or higher compared to male residents in the same age group, according to the data.
