In this brief, the authors examine changes in enrollments at the Los Angeles Community College District between fall 2017 and summer 2023 to document the extent of pandemic-era enrollment declines overall and across student populations.

The newly released enrollment data from the National Center on Education Statistics for the 2022-23 school year point to moderate enrollment gains for traditional public schools. The recent enrollment gains though are smaller than the cumulative enrollment losses since 2019-20 and are not uniform. This paper takes stock of enrollment losses today…

The fall 2023 and spring 2024 undergraduate enrollment increases, marking the first growth since the COVID-19 pandemic, show signs of a post-pandemic turnaround for higher education. However, a significant share of current undergraduates will eventually disengage from college before earning a degree or other credential. They will join tens of…

In 2008 and 2012, Pioneer Institute published reports documenting declines in enrollment in Massachusetts' public schools. At the time, enrollment had fallen by about 35,000 students over a decade, or roughly 0.5 percent per year, with especially large drops in western Massachusetts and parts of Cape Cod. This paper examines enrollment trends…

Both Canada and the United States enrol a significant number of international students. However, in March 2020, both countries closed their borders and increased restrictions to international travel due to COVID-19, which had a direct impact on international students' ability to travel between their home countries and study destinations. This…

Washington's high school graduation rate has increased over the past decade. In 2022, 82 percent of high school students in the state graduated in four years, a six-percentage point increase over the 2013 graduation rate. This report looks at postsecondary enrollment trends for Washington high school graduates in the classes of 2020 and 2021…

The Higher Education Emergency Relief (HEER) Fund had two main purposes: (1) to ensure that colleges could continue to provide education to students in the wake of the pandemic and (2) to provide emergency financial assistance through colleges directly to students. Four years after the onset of the pandemic, this ARCC Network brief uses college…

According to the American Community Survey (ACS), about one-quarter (24.8 percent) of the U.S. population over the age of 3 was enrolled in school in 2021. This report provides a comprehensive picture of the state of school enrollment using recently published data from the ACS. It outlines modern enrollment trends while also offering comparisons…

The National Student Clearinghouse Research Center reports on the shifting transfer landscape during COVID-19 in a rapid response report series titled "COVID-19 Transfer Mobility, and Progress." Commissioned by the Research Center, this special journalist's report offers insights into how some colleges were able to grow their transfer…

Schools are facing a growing number of disaffected parents. To win them back, says one policy analyst, educators need to take their concerns to heart. After two-and-a-half pandemic years, writes policy analyst Robert Pondiscio, public schools are facing a growing number of disaffected parents--a trend reflected in declining enrollments. Pondiscio…

Senate Bill 19-129, concerning the regulation of online schools, calls for the Colorado Department of Education's Office of Blended and Online Learning to produce an annual report on the number of students who withdraw from Colorado K-12 online schools after the pupil enrollment count date. This report is required to include the dates on which…

"Voting with Their Feet: A State-level Analysis of Public Charter School and District Public School Enrollment Trends" shows hundreds of thousands of families switched to charter schools during the first full school year of the pandemic. During the 2020-21 school year, charter school enrollment grew 7%, the largest increase in half a…

Weak labor markets typically lead young workers to invest in skills. High unemployment during COVID diverged from prior downturns: enrollment at community colleges dropped by 9.5 percent between 2019 and 2020, with the drop larger among men. COVID disruptions generated supply-side impacts on courses of study requiring significant capital and…

The COVID-19 pandemic has no real historical precedent, and higher education institutions started school in very unusual circumstances in the fall of 2020. In this environment, it is useful to look at the short-term impacts of recent crises for lessons. This article briefly reviews data on enrollment and funding of public institutions from two…

Student debt levels were already pronounced before the pandemic hit, with $91.1 billion in annual federal student lending in 2019-20, up from $20.7 billion in 1990-91. Over that same period, per-student borrowing rose from $2,110 to $6,276, after adjusting for inflation. Evidence available as of Nov. 20, 2021, suggests that the COVID-19 downturn…