University enrollments drop as students ponder: ‘Is college worth it?’

The pandemic has changed how colleges and universities operate in drastic ways.

Many classes moved online — and many students re-examined their plans.

According to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, U.S. colleges and universities have seen a 5.1% decrease in enrollment over the last two years.

One reason behind the drop: some prospective or current students started to ask, “Is college really worth it?”

According to MyStudentVoices, 33% of college graduates do not have jobs in their field.

Valerie Patterson, a senior at California State University Northridge, feels that colleges are manipulating young minds into going to college.

“When I was a senior in high school,” Patterson said, “teachers were like, ‘Oh you need to go to college’ … and then they would have college fairs and go to colleges to look at them.”

“I don’t think you need college to be successful,” said Brenna White, another senior at CSUN, “but college is a great thing, though it’s not necessary.”

However, White says college helps students launch  careers. Instead of a community college, White decided to attend a 4-year university with motivation from her parents. She endures a regular 4-hour round trip commute from her home to the CSUN campus.  She admits it was a struggle in the beginning and admits to having doubts in her educational path. But White believes going to college helped her find her career path and could not be happier.

COVID-19 is one of several factors that have decreased enrollment at CSUN in recent years.

Director of admissions Aaron Lindberg says that in Fall 2020, CSUN had 49,000 students enrolled. In 2021, Lindberg says the university enrolled 43,600 students – an 11% decrease from the year before.

Enrollment decreased another 3% by the start of the Fall 2022 semester. CSUN then enrolled 42,200 students. Lindberg also talks about the birth rates declining. 

“At a national level we are experiencing what is called, ‘the demographic cliff,’ meaning at the Great recession, which was in 2008, the birth rates declined substantially. Now …  there’s just less students of college age these days.”

Lindberg says that some of this decrease in enrollment applications coincides with COVID-19,. Students’ financial burdens have taken a toll.

Anthony Mata originally attended Pierce College but says he had to drop out due to financial issues with his college.

“I would go to the financial office to try and get my FAFSA and see why it isn’t in my account,” recalled Mata, “and they told me that they didn’t have any records of my high school diploma or any credentials and they couldn’t give me my money for the financial aid.”

“So I kind of had to fight with them,” Mata continued, “but yeah I couldn’t pay for that year, for the tuition, for books and everything so I dropped out ‘cause I was only working, like, maybe 18 hours max a week and I was not making enough money to cover anything.”

Mata thinks that colleges should do a better job with handling student finances. He also has thought about returning to school. 

For many people, online learning became a major struggle and contributed to many college students’ desire to leave school. Mata says he likes in person classes more than being online.

“I’m a very, like, in-person, hands-on learner so I really like that communication with the professor and being able to like go to them for any  questions and like explain it thoroughly,” said Mata, “With this, it was kind of like oh here’s my times try to message me at this time I will get to you when I can”.

Bobbi Korthius says that online learning destroyed her educational drive: “I wouldn’t pay $1,200 to read a book and try to teach myself. I can just go online and read a book if I want to learn about [a subject].”. 

Korthius attended Denver University, but found a government job and now says she didn’t need college in order to find a successful job in life. 

Korthuis also thought that she wasn’t learning enough from how much she had to pay for online learning. She believes that tuition should have been cheaper since all of her classes were full. Mata says that he too struggled with online learning, along with financial issues; this too was a main motivator to drop out. 

He says he’s more of a hands-on learner and could not grasp the idea of teaching yourself an entire textbook.

White said that online classes helped her by saving her a long commute from the Inland Empire to the San Fernando Valley. The online environment even helped her find more time to talk  with her professors in a classroom setting, she feels conversations are often cut short.

However, White also admitted to missing campus life and in-person interactions and now tries to go to campus as much as possible.

This show was produced by Francisco Campos, Ruby Cordova & Jonathan Greenstein