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College Enrollment Was Down by 250,000 This Fall Compared to Last Year

College Enrollment Was Down by 250,000 This Fall Compared to Last Year

“We’re in a crisis right now, and it’s a complicated one”

Perhaps more young people would rather join the workforce during record low unemployment than take on massive debt.

National Public Radio reports:

Fewer Students Are Going To College. Here’s Why That Matters

This fall, there were nearly 250,000 fewer students enrolled in college than a year ago, according to new numbers out Monday from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, which tracks college enrollment by student.

“That’s a lot of students that we’re losing,” says Doug Shapiro, who leads the research center at the Clearinghouse.

And this year isn’t the first time this has happened. Over the past eight years, college enrollment nationwide has fallen about 11%. Every sector — public state schools, community colleges, for-profits and private liberal arts schools — has felt the decline, though it has been especially painful for small private colleges, where, in some cases, institutions have been forced to close.

“We’re in a crisis right now, and it’s a complicated one,” says Angel Pérez, who oversees enrollment at Trinity College, a small liberal arts school in Hartford, Conn.

Why is this happening?

The biggest factor for the years of decline is the strong economy. The last time U.S. college enrollment went up was 2011, at the tail end of the recession. As the economy gets better, unemployment goes down — it’s currently at 3.5 % — and more people leave college, or postpone it, and head to work.

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Comments

A crisis? Why is this a crisis? Because you might have to cut back on unnecessary expenses? Because you might have to prioritize your spending? Because you might not be able to continually grow the salaries and life-time pension benefits of the many layers of administrative staff that you constantly stack on top of their bureaucratic departments?

Tough shit. The real world deals with these challenges all the time. You’re not entitled to shit, so quit whining and figure out how to cut some cost. Hint: maybe you could start with the “Studies” and “Equality” departments.

We are also seeing the results of falling birth rates. I don’t think you can take this raw number as a repudiation of the college way per se.

Trinity College used to be one of the best in the country. Now it is a joke. A place where students learn nothing except you get good grades pretending to be triggered. No STEM of consequence. Economics degree is worthless because the core courses are no longer required. Used to have an excellent American History, Literature, and music departments. But they woke.

Charles N. Steele | December 19, 2019 at 8:31 am

The “higher education” bubble is popping. Now if we can get state legislatures to slash funding for any college that teaches post-modernist new left BS, and start repealing federal subsidies, then to survive colleges will have to start teaching things of value.

Who said: “I like uneducated people.”

Hmmm, let’s consider, perhaps it’s the cost of college. Maybe it’s the idiot curriculum of colleges. Maybe it’s the lack of morals and ethics, the humorless nature of education, the Omni presence of alcohol,…

The reasons are manifold.