Nearly 1,300 colleges have closed since 1970, leaving students with incomplete degrees and no ... [+]
Less than half of students that were attending a college that closed ever re-enrolled at a different institution, according to a new report—the most comprehensive to date—on the impact of closures on student outcomes. Of the students that did re-enroll eventually, only 37% have earned a credential. Bottom line: only 17% of students displaced by a college closure go on to earn a degree or certificate.
Nearly 1,300 higher education institutions shut their doors in the half century between 1970 and 2020, according to the National Center for Education Statistics, leaving hundreds of thousands of students with a handful of credits, no degree and an uncertain path forward. Thousands more students are likely to be similarly uprooted in the coming years as the rate of college closures picks up, in part due to a regulatory crackdown on underperforming institutions and financial fallout from continuing enrollment declines. Between 2015 and 2020, 533 colleges closed, compared with 744 closures across the 45 years prior.
The new report, released Tuesday, is the first in a three-part series on closings planned by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center and the State Higher Education Executive Officers Association.
The report looks at 467 colleges and universities that closed between July 1, 2004 and June 30, 2020. Of those, nearly half were private, for-profit two-year colleges. About 28% of the institutions were for-profit, four-year colleges and another 17.8% were private, nonprofit four-year colleges. In total, the shuttered institutions had 143,215 enrolled students at the time they closed.
Students affected by college closures are more likely to be female, white and 30 years or older, according to the report. About 42% of them were pursuing two-year associates degrees and nearly one third were majoring in health professions or clinical sciences. That suggests, given the nationwide nursing shortage and widespread burnout in the healthcare industry in the wake of Covid-19, that it’s not only individual students, but also society as a whole, that is losing out as schools fold.
While most students impacted by closures were white, Hispanic and Black students were less likely to re-enroll elsewhere, according to the report. About 56% of Hispanic students and 57% of Black students re-enrolled post-closure, compared to 62% of white students. Between 28% and 34% of Black, Asian, Hispanic and Native American students stopped-out for more than a year before they returned to higher education, compared to only 19.5% of white students.
“The outcomes were a lot worse than I had expected,” said Doug Shapiro, vice president of research at the Clearinghouse and executive director of the research center. “Finding another institution that will not only accept the credits that you’ve already taken, but also … has the same or a similar program or a degree or certificate offering for you to complete at that institution without having to start over again in a new major is really a challenge for a lot of students.”
Once booted from their would-be alma mater, only 47% of students enrolled at another higher education institution. Just over a third of those students earned a credential. In the end, only 17% of the students that originally attended the closed institutions have graduated—a far cry from the 62% average six-year graduation rate.
Of the closures that the report examined, more than two thirds followed an orderly process that gave existing students sufficient notice of the pending closure, included a “teach out” agreement that would allow the students to re-enroll at a nearby institution, and put in place records and retention policies so that former students could access transcripts and other materials. The remaining third of colleges shut down abruptly, giving students little to no warning of the closure and few resources to continue their education.
Not surprisingly, the type of shutdown has consequences for student outcomes. Despite the fact that only a third of shuttered colleges close abruptly, seven in ten students faced an abrupt closure, according to the report. Abrupt closures were more common in the for-profit sector—About 45% of two-year for-profits and 26% of four-year for-profits closed suddenly. Only 42% of students that went through an abrupt closure at a for-profit, four-year college enrolled at another institution, compared to 70% of those whose former college had an orderly shutdown.
If they did re-enroll, students that attended shuttered for-profits tended to re-enroll at another for-profit, which perpetuates a problematic cycle, said Mikyung Ryu, director of research publications at the Clearinghouse.
“For-profit institutions tend to be known for very aggressive student recruitment. But then what happens after students enroll in that institution? Any academic advising services, support services—they really do not live up to those promises,” Ryu said. “And because for-profit institutions largely serve first generation students—particularly Latinos and Black students … we are seeing such a disproportionate negative impact on the minority population because they tend to enroll in another for-profit.”
