The current application situation at colleges and universities is anything but business as usual. It’s got some schools in a bit of a tailspin as they’re either overwhelmed, or underwhelmed, by the number of applications they’re receiving for the fall 2021 semester. And the applications this year look different from what was typical in the past.
Behind the strange trends, of course, is the fallout from COVID-19, which is affecting college applications in several ways. While some of these trends may be temporary, administrators and admissions professionals might want to pay attention since others may endure post-pandemic.
Here’s what universities and experts are seeing in this unusual application cycle.
- Students who took a gap year for 2020-2021 after college acceptance are now enrolling for the fall semester. A significant number of 2020 high school graduates deferred college after acceptance, taking a gap year instead of freshman year online. driving enrollment for the following year. After the pandemic restrictions prompted remote teaching and learning and schools across the country moved to a remote learning or hybrid program, many high school seniors who were accepted to higher education programs opted to defer enrollment for a year, when they might be more likely to have a more typical, in-person college experience. That deferral means that there are fewer freshman spots available for the new group of college seniors. National Student Clearinghouse Research Center reported that overall postsecondary enrollments declined 2.5 percent in fall 2020, about twice the rate of decline reported for fall 2019. The public two-year sector suffered the most from enrollment decline for the semester, but even at Harvard, 20 percent of accepted freshmen deferred enrollment last fall. Overall, there was a staggering 13.1 percent drop in freshman enrollment over the fall 2019 figure overall – more than 327,500 fewer students – but two-year institution enrollment decreased by 21 percent.
- Standardized tests are no longer ubiquitously required. Earlier this year, according to the National Association for College Admission Counseling (NACAC), more than 1450 US colleges and universities announced they are moving to a test-optional policy. The College Board, which administers the PSAT and SAT assessments, announced limited capacity in testing centers because of public health restrictions. Some students found their test was cancelled, and then the makeup tests were also canceled. Since this past summer, hundreds of colleges announced that because it was so difficult for high school seniors to safely take the SAT or ACT, they would no longer require standardized tests in the applications process. Ivy League schools like Harvard, Princeton and Yale are waiving the requirement only for this year’s high school graduating class, while others are keeping the tests optional for at least another year.
- At hundreds of colleges, application numbers are way down from previous years. The Common App, which more than a million students use each year when applying to college, reported in November that the number of students applying to higher education institutions was down by about eight percent among returning member colleges than the year before. Even large state university systems are seeing dramatic decreases in applications. For instance, the State University of New York – the largest system of public higher education in the US –reported applications were down about 20 percent, one of the largest annual decreases in the system’s 73-year history.
- Lower-income students are foregoing college or holding off from applying. The Common App reports seeing 16 percent fewer applicants who request fee waivers. There’s also been a similar drop off in applications from students who would be the first in their families to go to college. According to Form Your Future research, sponsored by National College Attainment Network, through early February 2021, 37.9 percent of the high school class of 2021 completed FAFSA applications, a 9.4 percent decrease from last year. What’s worse, the drop in FAFSA applications is greater at Title 1-eligible high schools, where at least 40 percent of all students are from low-income families.
- More students submitted or are submitting early applications. There are a few reasons more students than ever, on average, are applying either early action, and receive a non-binding decision in advance of the institutions’ regular decision date, or early decision, requiring accepted students to commit to enrolling to their first-choice school. For starters, the pandemic has slowed or completely curtailed college visits and in-person interviews, so students and their families get to know institutions by virtual contact and can evaluate more quickly. In addition, because a large percentage of colleges and universities have done away with standardized testing requirements, students who might not have considered “reach” schools within the realm of possibility are applying to more prestigious schools early.
- Ivy League and highly competitive schools are seeing staggering numbers of early apps. While applications are down in many higher education institutions, early applications have increased dramatically to Ivy League schools. At some schools, acceptance rates are dropping dramatically. Harvard for instance, received 10,086 early applications – an increase of 57 percent over last year – accepting 747 students, or just 7.4 percent of applicants. Other universities are accepting more early applying students than ever before such as Duke, which admitted 840 students out of 5,036 early decision applicants. And other highly competitive institutions are admitting some early applicants and will re-visit the applications in the spring. For its part, Yale admitted 837 early-applying students to the class of 2025 but deferred 50 percent of the record 7939 early-round applications for consideration in the spring. Yale denied admission to 38 percent of early applicants.