Freshman enrollment appears to decline for the first time since 2020

Freshman enrollment dropped more than 5% from last year at American colleges and universities, the largest decline since 2020 when COVID-19 and distance learning upended higher education, according to preliminary data released Wednesday by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, a nonprofit education group.

The finding comes roughly a year after the federal student aid system was dragged down by problems with the Free Application for Federal Student Aid form, commonly known as FAFSA, which led to maddening delays this year in processing families’ financial data to send to school administrators. That in turn held up the rollout of financial aid offers well into the summer, leaving many families struggling to determine how much college would cost.

By itself, the enrollment data does not establish that errors with the FAFSA form caused a significant number of students to postpone college out of frustration with the process or to choose lower-cost alternatives to four-year schools, such as community colleges or two-year degree programs.

But the numbers released Wednesday highlighted a drop in freshman enrollment, particularly at schools serving students from lower-income families that disproportionately depend on federal aid to afford college.

Most significantly, the data indicated that both public and private four-year schools that admit the largest shares of students receiving Pell grants saw freshman enrollment dip by more than 10% from 2023 levels.

Pell grants provide a subsidy of up to $7,395 per year for low-income students and offer a financial boost for schools that disproportionately enroll lower-income students. The grants generally support families in the lower half of household income distribution — those earning $60,000 a year or less — but more than half have typically gone to students whose families earn less than $20,000 annually.

Increasing the maximum size of the Pell Grant for the 2024-25 academic year has been celebrated by Education Department officials as one of the Biden administration’s proudest accomplishments. At the urging of department officials, lawmakers increased the maximum award by $900 total, up from $6,495 in 2022.

But the steep drop-off in freshman enrollment at schools with the largest populations of lower income students suggested that far fewer incoming students were able to take advantage of the more generous award this year, and that any positive financial impact on those schools was blunted by the decline.

Doug Shapiro, the executive director of the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, said that a variety of factors, including the Supreme Court decision last year ending race-conscious admissions, anxiety over excessive student debt and a strong labor market may have all played some role affecting individual decisions about college, and it was unclear to what extent headaches with FAFSA may have contributed.

But based on observations from the downturn in 2020, Shapiro said that when high school seniors deferred college that year, only an “infinitesimal” number returned in the years after, leaving a permanent dent in enrollment. For that reason, he said, there was little evidence that the numbers would bounce back next year with more students than usual flocking back to college.

“Life happens,” Shapiro told reporters during a call Tuesday. “These students end up with jobs and sometimes families, and they find it harder and harder as time goes on to think about entering college again.”

Before the report, the Education Department published its own analysis Tuesday, stating that the total number of students it expects to receive federal student aid has risen by 3% since 2023 and that 10% more students are on track to receive a Pell grant this year.

But in its report, the department acknowledged that it received 2% fewer applications for federal student aid this year compared to the year before and said “that gap is larger for high school seniors and other first-time filers.”

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