Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
head count
noun
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ As a Senate vote on the balanced-budget amendment draws closer, so too does the head count.
▪ However, Mr Nasser concedes it has been only recently that he has made real progress in reducing his head count.
▪ In the end, however, Mosbacher decided to stick with the traditional head count.
▪ The council tax will retain the most objectionable parts of the poll tax - the head count tax on the individual.
▪ There is still no adequate head count of the revolutionary intelligentsia.
▪ Thirty men in all, by Grant's head count.
Wiktionary
head count
n. 1 An act of counting a small group of people. 2 The exact number of people in a group or organization.
WordNet
head count
n. number of people in a particular group [syn: headcount]
Usage examples of "head count".
I whispered my little prayer over and over for an hour or more after lights out--pausing only momentarily as Cadet Sergeant Rivers passed by, making his head count at ten o'clock.