Summary
Overall, summarized projections show growth, despite the concerns expressed to, and by, Council. These projections, in their third submission, express either confidence in future enrollment or confidence in their knowledge of their recruitment markets. Regardless, overall, the proposed worst-case scenario for total enrollment, is a 5.9% drop from the midline projection, or nearly 35,000 students across all levels of enrollment. In the optimal scenario, they project a potential 5.5% increase from the midline, or just over 32,000 students. As this was the first time that SCHEV has required the institutions to provide low and high ranges with their projections, thus staff little to basis for confidence that these ranges represent the outcomes, staff can report that most institutions took the process quite seriously, looking both at the changes in federal policy, the shifting markets, and for the public institutions, the desire to set targets that they are confident of achieving for the Institutional Performance Standards.
In this submission, total fall enrollment is projected to increase from 553,296 students in 2024 to 580,801 in 2029. However, assuming the institutions accurately estimated the projected full-time equivalent enrollment (FTE) would drop substantially from 460,433 to 392,706 annual FTE. This drop in enrollment, measured by the annual numbers of course credits taken and divided by 30 for undergraduate and first professional students and 24 for graduate students, to approximate the numbers of students taking a full course load each year, without taking the maximum number of credits typically allowed. Clearly, the expectation is for greater enrollment of part-time students, but variances in the FTEs estimated across institutions suggest a quality issue. For example, the actual annual FTEs for first professional students in 2024 exceeded the enrolled number of students – 13,012 FTE compared to 11,435 individual students. This is the normal relationship between fall headcount and FTE of first professional students while the projections are almost one-to-one. It is worth noting, given events at the federal level last month, SCHEV has historically followed federal definitions for the designation of first professional degree programs: law, medicine (MD/DO), dentistry, pharmacy, veterinary medicine, and divinity programs (private institutions only). Further, SCHEV stayed with the designation of “first professional” when the US Education Department changed to “Doctor’s, Applied” in recognition of these all being doctor’s degrees in names but still distinguish them from the doctor of philosophy which was called “Doctor’s, Research.”
In graduate education, institutions project an increase from 106,075 students to 110, 340 between 2024 and 2029. During that time, the graduate student FTE enrollment appears to shrink from 85,280 to 70,071 annual FTE. Periods of increased part-time graduate enrollment is common in times of economic change, however it also seems likely this may result from the end of the Grad-PLUS loan and essentially limitless federal borrowing and the newly created $100,000 maximum of federal loans for graduate programs. This change alone is likely to have profound impacts on graduate enrollment and program offerings in the future as schools, students, others adapt to limits where there were none. Graduate student projections have the widest variation from the midline projections, between seven and eight percent above or below, while first professional students were between about two and three and a half percent on either side of the midline, while undergraduates were closer to five percent differences from the midline projections.
Undergraduate enrollment, excluding high school dual enrollment (one of the changes made to this last submission), is projected to grow by about 20,000 students from 379,078 to 399,137 students, also with a corresponding decrease in FTE enrollment (341,754 to 313,419 FTE from 2024-25 to 2029-30) which appears to be primarily a result of underestimating FTE by the private institutions. High school dual enrollment is projected to increase modestly from 56,708 in 2024 (but currently estimated at 59,309 for fall of 2025) to 62,117 in fall 2029, accounting for 20,387 to 23,646 FTE during the same time period, with 90% to 92% of the enrollment at the VCCS.
Despite having just had what is projected to be Virginia’s largest class of high school graduates for the next 15 years and despite our warnings/concerns that as many as 5,000 of those graduates are estimated to be undocumented and enrollment of international students is likely to be constrained, institutions to project an increase of just about 5,000 first-time in college (FTIC) students from 60,106 in 2024 to 65,156 in 2029. Typically, about 75% of FTIC students from Virginia are recent high school graduates suggesting the real change in in-state FTIC from Virginia will go from approximately 46,000 to just under 50,000, still a significant increase that indicates a capture rate of just about 50% of all Virginia high school graduates, without accounting for decreases resulting from undocumented students not showing up at Virginia colleges and universities.
Marked changes in the enrollment of international students has been a topic of discussion in the news lately and mentioned by college presidents. Overall, international student enrollment rates have been a mixed bag. The public four-years experienced a net loss of 866 students across all levels from last fall to this fall, with 1,153 students lost at the graduate and professional level. There was an increase of 287 international students at the undergraduate level, with George Mason University and Virginia Tech gaining 151 and 221 respectively. However, there was a significant decrease in international FTIC from 1,832 at the public four-year institutions and an increase from 478 to 572 at the private four-year institutions.
Finally, the last major category of students are New Transfer students at the undergraduate level. Overall, we see a modest increase from 19,322 to 20,420 in-state students, and a comparatively smaller increase in out-of-state transfers 8,970 to 9,375, or a 4.5% increase compared to 5.7% increase in Virginia residents. This is slightly less than the projected 6% increase in out-of-state FTIC, most of which are projected by the public four-year colleges. Both of these increases are projected during a time of significant competition from many states that are facing double-digit decreases in their numbers of high school graduates.
On the face, these projections still seem optimistic to staff, but are generally consistent across the three submissions, suggesting that the institutions are portraying confidence in their ability to recruit undergraduate students. The low and high bounds included within the projections provide additional insight, but do not make it easier to discern if institutional intent is more optimistic than likelihood during dramatic shifts in market. In the final analysis, Virginia Code is quite specific that the admissions policies, and thus enrollment actions, of the individual institutions is the sole responsibility of the individual boards and thus success or failure is in their hands. As for the Council’s responsibility to approve or disapprove the projections, the question at hand is whether these projections are appropriate for state planning activities for the next two years.
The Western Interstate Compact for Higher Education (WICHE) in their 2024 projections of high school graduates, projected 91,213 graduates compared to 94,328 actual graduates from public high schools. The anticipated peak between now and 2029 is this year, with 95,937 graduates and a decline through 2033, with a peak in 2034 and continued decline to 83,941 in 2042. While typically these projections have been found to be conservative and understate the actual numbers below, staff is of the opinion that they may overstate the supply of high school graduates in that they may contain approximately 5% undocumented students each year.
The Higher Ed Immigration Portal, a project that exists to advocate for Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals (DACA students), undocumented, refugee, other immigrants, and international students estimates in 2018 there were approximately 5,000 undocumented students graduating from Virginia high schools annually, and 13,122 undocumented students in Virginia higher education. Beyond these numbers, they estimate 62,000 first generation immigrants (born abroad and immigrated to the U.S.) and 85,000 second generation immigrants (U.S. -born individuals with at least one immigrant parent) also enrolled in Virginia colleges and universities. In all likelihood, given that these estimates are seven years old, the numbers are probably a bit larger and they represent a risk factor to institutional enrollment as current United States policy is aimed at reducing the presence of these individuals.
The American Immigration Council, using American Community Survey microdata from 2023, estimates 258,800 undocumented immigrants living in Virginia. They further estimate 12,700 DACA-eligible residents, with 12,441 having been granted DACA status. From SCHEV’s records, we know that in fall 2024, there were 334 DACA students enrolled at the public institutions. This represents a steady decrease from fall 2019 in which 1,288 DACA students were reported to us. Further, in fall 2024, 228 undocumented students were reported as enrolled at Virginia public institutions.