In a striking turnaround, the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center said Monday that a methodology error led to an undercount of first-year students in its preliminary enrollment figures for fall 2024 — and subsequent research reveals that the enrollment actually increased.
The research center in October released a preliminary enrollment report that found headcounts of first-year students in fall 2024 shrank 5% year over year. But that's incorrect, according to Doug Shapiro, the research center’s executive director.
The research center mistakenly labeled some first-year students as dual enrollees. As a result, its analysis overcounted the number of dual-enrolled students — high school students who take college classes — and undercounted first-year college students.
“Our subsequent research finds freshman enrollment increased this fall," Shapiro said in a statement on Monday. The research center did not provide updated preliminary figures but said it would release final numbers on Jan. 23.
"We deeply regret this error and are conducting a thorough review to understand the root cause and implement measures to prevent such occurrences in the future," Shapiro said.
The preliminary figures were based on data from 51.9% of the colleges that report to the clearinghouse.
But Monday's reversal comes from a methodology error — not from shifts caused by a more complete data set.
The now discredited fall 2024 first-year numbers had reflected poorly on the U.S. Department of Education, which took heat for possibly causing an enrollment drop by its delay- and glitch-plagued rollout of the new Free Application for Federal Student Aid.
James Kvaal, the top higher education official at the Education Department, said Monday evening that an uptick in first-year enrollment is consistent with the agency’s internal metrics, which show increases in the number of students receiving federal aid this year.
“We are encouraged and relieved that updated data from the National Student Clearinghouse shows freshman enrollment is up this school year," Kvaal said in a statement.
The clearinghouse shares preliminary enrollment figures through its Stay Informed reports. The center said Monday that the error also impacted previous Stay Informed reports, though it didn’t specify how many. The error also affected a special November 2024 report on 18-year-old first-year students.
However, since more high school students participated in dual enrollment programs this fall, the error in the October 2024 report had a greater impact than on previous Stay Informed reports, Shapiro said.
Past Stay Informed reports have in fact shared enrollment trends that differed significantly from the research center’s final enrollment tallies.
In October 2023, for instance, clearinghouse researchers estimated that first-year enrollment had declined by 3.6%. Final results, published in January 2024, instead found that the number had ticked up 0.8%.
The error only impacted first-year and dual-enrolled student counts. It did not affect the total number of undergraduate students, according to the clearinghouse.
The clearinghouse discovered the fall 2024 error when compiling final figures for its January report. The final reports use different methodologies to determine first-year students numbers than the Stay Informed reports. The clearinghouse in recent years has released one Stay Informed report each for spring and fall enrollment.
But the clearinghouse said it will now halt publication of its Stay Informed reports "until the revised methodology has been thoroughly vetted." The center launched the reports in 2020 to share preliminary enrollment information at the height of the coronavirus pandemic.
