Explain the demographics…

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:International students are not driving the competition but they do contribute to it.

My neighbor boards Chinese students in her home for a local private high school. They are still coming here with enough cash to buy the car of their choice and pay tuition and room and board that is on par with many colleges in coa. China may have a real estate problem but they still have families who can afford U.S. schools.

Yes. Because the Chinese middle class is larger than the entire US population. There are plenty of wealthy Chinese people who can afford US universities.

This. US demographics don't matter. Chinese, Indian and other Internationals will be thrilked to pay full freight to go to college here

+1. The percentage of internationals in most U.S. schools is still very small compared to the UK; excepting the schools that have already done it — NYU, BU etc. — selective schools (top 100 or so, including SLACs) will simply up their international percentage to make up for the demographic cliff (full pay or mostly full pay). Less selective private schools with relatively low endowment per student will not be able to do that, so they will be in trouble.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:International students are not driving the competition but they do contribute to it.

My neighbor boards Chinese students in her home for a local private high school. They are still coming here with enough cash to buy the car of their choice and pay tuition and room and board that is on par with many colleges in coa. China may have a real estate problem but they still have families who can afford U.S. schools.

Yes. Because the Chinese middle class is larger than the entire US population. There are plenty of wealthy Chinese people who can afford US universities.

This. US demographics don't matter. Chinese, Indian and other Internationals will be thrilked to pay full freight to go to college here

But only for certain schools. They will likely care about brand.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As was discussed on another thread, there are actually vey few international students accepted (many apply). The selection is harsher for students from abroad.

I don't see that changing any time soon, because China has a real estate problem, and other Asian countries and Europe are bordering recessions. Most foreigners simply don't have the money for international tuition, room and board.

So take that out of the equation.

You're left with every US student dreaming of the Ivies and assimilated. THAT is the real problem! The small no-name colleges are rapidly closing, but none of these are colleges most of us have ever heard of. The majority of kids apply to the better-known ones... hence the scrum at the gate.

And we aalps discussed this wasn’t the case at many selective schools where internationals students make up 10 to a full 25 percent of the enrolled student body,

[Anonymous]

The so-called cliff is more a slope. The ending point is the size of the domestic college applying pool of 2012.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:International students are not driving the competition but they do contribute to it.

My neighbor boards Chinese students in her home for a local private high school. They are still coming here with enough cash to buy the car of their choice and pay tuition and room and board that is on par with many colleges in coa. China may have a real estate problem but they still have families who can afford U.S. schools.

This. And it’s not just China. Also India and the Middle East.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:International students are not driving the competition but they do contribute to it.

My neighbor boards Chinese students in her home for a local private high school. They are still coming here with enough cash to buy the car of their choice and pay tuition and room and board that is on par with many colleges in coa. China may have a real estate problem but they still have families who can afford U.S. schools.

Yes. Because the Chinese middle class is larger than the entire US population. There are plenty of wealthy Chinese people who can afford US universities.

This. US demographics don't matter. Chinese, Indian and other Internationals will be thrilked to pay full freight to go to college here

"thrilked," btw, is a portmanteau of "thrilled" and "milked."

[Anonymous]

The dip will not effect the top 100 or even the top 1,000 schools. It's the bottom of the barrel schools, either unaccredited or taking kids money for degrees they'll never earn or for jobs they'll never get that will be in trouble, and that's ok

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As was discussed on another thread, there are actually vey few international students accepted (many apply). The selection is harsher for students from abroad.

I don't see that changing any time soon, because China has a real estate problem, and other Asian countries and Europe are bordering recessions. Most foreigners simply don't have the money for international tuition, room and board.

So take that out of the equation.

You're left with every US student dreaming of the Ivies and assimilated. THAT is the real problem! The small no-name colleges are rapidly closing, but none of these are colleges most of us have ever heard of. The majority of kids apply to the better-known ones... hence the scrum at the gate.

And we aalps discussed this wasn’t the case at many selective schools where internationals students make up 10 to a full 25 percent of the enrolled student body,

Selective schools are at most 10% international undergrads on average (that is the average at Ivy schools).

Now if you include graduate students, that may skew the stats.

[Anonymous]

Number is applications and number of attendees are two different numbers. Kids are applying to 20+ schools now but obviously only attending one. Are more kids going to be waiting until May to find out if they get off waiting lists?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:But only for certain schools. They will likely care about brand.

Most will likely care about brand, but there are still tons of families happy to get any foot in the U.S. door.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I’ve heard people on this forum and others say that college admissions are so though now because of a demographic surge — more kids applying to colleges. But the WaPo article from today about colleges closing said we’re in a demographic dip. Which is it? It seems like it’s now super hard to get into the top tier and even middle tier schools, but the bottom tier schools are closing due to low enrollment. Where are all the average kids gojng?

The answer is simple, there was a spike in birth rate around 2006-2007, so there are more kids competing for approx. the same number of places in college, ie more competition and harder to get in. Based on the graph, it will be less competitive for the 2010-2015 cohort when they reach the college application age....

[Anonymous]

[Anonymous]

Agree with everyone that the demographic dip won't affect competitive college admissions in a favorable way, and if anything it will give administrators at elite schools an excuse to increase their international or OOS admits. For example, at my alma mater (HYP), the % of international students has gone from 4% when I was there to almost 15% this year. So that aspect of student population definitely contributes to the perception that schools have become difficult to get into.

The demographic dip will and is already affecting primary and secondary education. In my area, public high schools in well-off suburban districts predict that their current graduating classes will drop by 25% by the time my current 2015-born, 3rd grade child is in HS. Independent schools that are not the top schools in their city are suffering and already making plans for the demographic cliff- go to any independent school association conference and it's one of the main topics of conversation. Schools that don't have attached high schools are especially worried, because the K-5 and K-8 schools will be hit first and are already seeing declines in applications. As primary, mid and lower tier independent schools close, shrink or consolidate, you'll see even more people pushing to get entry into the top schools that are left.

So in short: demographic cliff won't help but will just have the same people fighting for less of the top and not-quite-top spots. Unfortunately the anxiety that a lot of parents feel about increasing competition for decreasing resources has a lot of factual support.