404 sats \ 7 replies \ @Krv77 17 Sep freebie \ on: Back to School—A Critique of the College Model econ
Without reading the article, I predict that as the government payouts become less and less due to inflation, coupled by lower enrollments, the smaller colleges will begin to reduce in number. Then, the larger colleges will soak up the students the smaller colleges lost. However, the large ones will still be feeling the crunch of lower enrollments and reduced spending abilities. Thus, they will have to massively downscale. This might be where free market / practical education options might see an opening. If a business can create shorter, more condensed, more results focused education option, it would be appealing to those who can't afford multiyear expensive colleges that focus mostly on theoretical concepts.
If you take the top 50 or so colleges, their enrollments have been pretty steady since just after WWII. My guess is that there will continue being plenty of enrollment for them, especially factoring in international students.
Other than that, I think we will see much of what you describe and are already seeing some of it.
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Enrollment has been steady for the top 50 since 1945?
Where are the excess students going? The bottom 150?
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Don't hold me to that precise year or cutoff, but for many decades it has been true for big established universities.
There are thousands of small colleges. I think there were upwards of 8k at the peak and a few thousand have closed.
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But what about large state colleges like university of California system?
I think enrollment has increased since 1950 or whatever year
I will do some research
I don’t have access to a computer right now. This site has a lot of relevant data , I think
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That's probably right. I'll retreat to the 70's, as that's probably more widely applicable across the nation. On the eastern side of the country, most of these schools' enrollment plateaued after the GI bill, but the West Coast was still growing rapidly.
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That makes more sense
I remember thinking that ucla was a lot smaller in 1970 vs today.
Even vs 1990
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