Home News Who’s Up, Who’s Down and Why – Inside Higher ed

Who’s Up, Who’s Down and Why – Inside Higher ed

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Dig deeper into the state of community college enrollments, and you’ll find some hints at what could be keeping some institutions afloat while others sink.

Community college enrollments are suffering. Badly.

Nationally, they are down 9.5 percent, according to the latest report from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center. Community college freshman enrollment is down by 19 percent. Enrollment of underrepresented minorities has taken an especially hard hit — it’s down by nearly 30 percent.

Some colleges are doing worse than others — and some are doing well. But it’s hard to pinpoint exactly why. Inside Higher Ed requested enrollment data from every state’s community college system but to date has received information from fewer than half the states. Several systems have said they don’t expect to release numbers until January.

While experts agree that there are not yet any clear trends emerging from the rubble of fall enrollment caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, they have some strong hypotheses.

“If we take a step back and think about what happens during recessions, I think the typical expectation is that community college enrollments would increase,” said Justin Ortagus, assistant professor of higher education administration and policy at the University of Florida. “Of course, that’s not happened during this period, nationally.”

Ortagus believes a few factors are at play. First, enrollment at for-profit colleges — direct competitors for many students who attend community colleges — is holding steady. This is likely due to their marketing efforts and deregulation by the Trump administration, he said.

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