U.S. Secretary of Education Dr. Miguel Cardona.
As colleges and universities move steadily toward fall 2022, many in higher education are thinking critically about how to counteract the damage done to enrollment since the COVID-19 pandemic.
“The 21st Century economy is fundamentally a knowledge economy, which is why the enrollment decline is so alarming,” said U.S. Secretary of Education Dr. Miguel Cardona, who provided opening remarks at the Lumina Foundation’s webinar titled, Our Nation’s Enrollment Plunge: Reversing the Trend. Lumina, a private foundation working to ensure 60% of U.S. adults have a certification or credential of value by 2025, gathered scholars, policy makers, and workforce leaders together to discuss how they addressed the barriers facing students during the pandemic, and how higher education can attract and cultivate new learners.
At least one million students have not enrolled in college since fall 2020, according to the National Student Clearinghouse, a nonprofit that provides educational data and research covering 97% of all U.S. institutions. This enrollment crisis hit community colleges, minoritized, low-income, or male student populations hardest, but almost all institutions experienced severe declines two years in a row.
Cardona called these students the “missing million,” and said their loss could be felt in higher education for “decades.”
James Kvaal, U.S. Under Secretary for Education, said that the recent $400 increase to the Pell Grant may help those potential students who feel they cannot afford to go to college. But, he added, “the purchasing power of the Pell is about a third of what it was historically. We really need to get those Pell Grant dollars back up to bring college costs back into reach for all students.”
Kvaal said many schools were able to use COVID relief funds to cancel institutional student debt, often a barrier to students being able to re-enroll or access their financial aid. Others, like San Jose City College and Evergreen Valley College in California, used some of their COVID relief funds to encourage enrollment by offering free tuition.
