College enrollment is falling at a 'concerning' rate, new data reveals [View all]

Source: The Guardian

Sun 8 Dec 2024 07.00 EST


College enrollment is dropping at a “concerning” rate, according to new data. Data from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center shows enrollment of 18-year-old freshmen has dropped by 5% this fall semester. The data reflects enrollments reported for 1.4 million 18-year-old freshmen as of 31 October 2024.

The decline is most significant at both public and private, non-profit four-year colleges, which have seen a more than 6% decline in enrollment. For 46 states, Inside Higher Ed noted, the average drop was almost 7%. At prestigious universities with lower acceptance rates, the largest drops in enrollment were among freshmen of color. Black freshmen, for example, enrolled 16.9% less at highly selective public and private, non-profit four-year schools.

The primary reason for the drop, experts say, is more complicated. Julie J Park, an education professor at the University of Maryland, cited “a national conversation that’s been going on for a while” about a “potential ‘enrollment cliff’”.

The enrollment cliff concept came about within higher education after years of declining birth rates in the US, triggered by the Great Recession. Earlier this year, the CDC released data indicating that the US had hit a historic low in its annual number of births – declining 2% from 2022 to 2023 and then 3% in 2023. “Since the most recent high in 2007, the number of births has declined 17%, and the general fertility rate has declined 21%,” the August 2024 data shows.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/dec/08/college-enrollment-declining