Kentucky higher education sounds alarm over drops in enrollment, aid applications
Overall enrollment and applications for student aid are down across the state, a warning sign that Kentucky’s already underserved populations may be facing challenges outside of the classroom that keep them from enrolling.
Compared to this time last year, enrollment in the state’s community college system is down 9 percent, while overall enrollment this past fall at public four-year institutions is down 2 percent, according to the state’s Council on Postsecondary Education.
At the same time completion of the complex Free Application for Federal Student Aid form — better known as the FAFSA and a necessity to become eligible for many grants, loans and scholarships that make education more affordable — is down 18 percent in Kentucky compared to this time last year.
First-generation students, students of color, adult learners, those facing food, housing or transportation insecurity likely make up much of the enrollment and FAFSA decline, local higher education leaders say. Those populations already faced several systemic barriers to attaining education, but pandemic-related economic downturn and a widening digital divide has made an uphill climb even steeper.
“There’s so many reasons and every family’s reason is different about why they aren’t going to college right now,” said Kentucky Community and Technical College System Chancellor Kris Williams. “And and I think really the point I want to make is that our colleges are here, and we’re as accessible as we can be on any given day.”
Issues with childcare, internet access limit many
At the start of the pandemic, Jennifer Lindon, Hazard Community and Technical College’s president, said they initially thought that community colleges might see an enrollment boost from students looking to stay closer to home and take advantage of cheaper online classes.
Instead, HCTC, which has campuses in four Eastern Kentucky counties, is seeing a 20 percent enrollment decline compared to last year, Lindon said. An individual students’ reasoning for not attending can obviously vary, but Lindon said many former students told her they were juggling multiple responsibilities at home.
“Many times they are the primary breadwinner in the home,” Lindon said. “Some of them did lose their jobs because of COVID. Maybe they were working in food service industry or retail. And so they had to take on other jobs.”
Lindon said many students she’s spoken with said they hope to come back when they’re able to.
An HCTC survey conducted last fall among about 250 of the currently 2,500-student school found that 65 percent of those students surveyed identified coping with stress and mental health as an academic obstacle. About 43 percent of that same group said they were also caring for children, aging parents or others.
Across the state’s community college system, nearly a third of students have children, said Williams. As many K-12 schools have been a mixed bag of reopenings, many college students have had to help their small children learn online alongside them.
Access to online classes was often complicated if a student lacked high-speed internet or enough devices to keep students or their children on top of their school work, Lindon said.
At BCTC’s campuses across central Kentucky, school officials installed high-speed wi-fi hot spots that are accessible to students in the parking lots, said Koffi Akakpo, the school’s president.
In Eastern Kentucky, HCTC has worked to put wi-fi hotspots in counties where the school doesn’t have a campus — including one wi-fi hotspot complete with available laptops and a printer all housed inside Campton Baptist Church in Wolfe County.
‘This disenfranchises them even more.’
For many Kentuckians, college affordability is a major obstacle to attaining any form of higher education, said Aaron Thompson, the president of the state’s Council on Postsecondary Education. Wading through the complex and sometimes confusing FAFSA form can open up a student to various forms of federal aid and make them eligible for many college scholarships.
Earlier this month, the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education, began a public campaign to boost FAFSA rates and call on education leaders to try to find solutions to declining enrollment.
The reasons FAFSA completion is down across the state and nationally are numerous, Thompson said. Chief among them is simply that the form is complicated and would be hard for a student or someone in their household to complete without help.
Thompson, who has kids in college, said even he finds himself getting frustrated filling out a FAFSA, but he has the resources and people necessary to get through it. Whereas a high schooler this year, who because of pandemic restrictions likely has less access to help from in-school counselors, may have to rely on those in their household. For a student who might be the first in their family to go to college this would be a tough task.
“I can give you a thousand other examples of why this is going to hurt the first generation, the low-income, the students of color — those who have been historically disenfranchised,” Thompson said. “This disenfranchises them even more.”
According to the Form Your Future FAFSA completion tracker, which translates federal education data into a more accessible chart, the FAFSA completion rate at Kentucky high schools with a generally higher minority population is down 21.5 percent.
“It’s particularly troubling that so many of the declines are in populations that we especially serve — our underrepresented and under- resourced students,” said Williams, who added that a recently signed federal law will limit the FAFSA to a max of 36 questions, however that change isn’t expected for a few more years.
Scholarship opportunities that would provide for free education for many Kentuckians are only available after completing a FAFSA, Thompson said and specifically mentioned the Work Ready Kentucky Scholarship, that would provide up to 60 free credit hours at a number of Kentucky schools.
Even much pandemic-related aid to college students is determined by FAFSA data. University of Kentucky President Eli Capilouto announced in an email to students on Thursday that $8.9 million in federal aid earmarked to 6,000 students with unmet financial aid. FAFSA completion is required for that aid.
Access to basic needs also a challenge
According to the HCTC survey, 35 percent of students identified paying for food as an obstacle, while nearly another quarter said finding transportation was a challenge.
Access to constant, nutritious foods can be challenging to obtain in parts of Eastern Kentucky, especially if someone lacked the transportation necessary to get to a grocery store, said Jenny Williams, an English professor at HCTC. Williams is also on the board of North Fork local foods — an organization which runs the local farmers markets as well as food access work.
A poor diet or just plain hunger could lead to a student being off their game in the classroom and suffering in other areas of life as well, Williams said.
“I think we’re all aware of the fact that when little children don’t have full bellies, they can’t sit and behave properly and learn in school,” Williams said. “But that’s true about adults, too. We all need a healthy diet in order to be able to perform at our best.”
In fall 2019, 10 percent of BCTC students identified as homeless or struggling with housing insecurity, said BCTC President Koffi Akakpo.
BCTC opened a pantry offering free dry goods, kitchen shelf items and personal hygiene staples in the college’s Leestown campus in November 2019 just months before the beginning of the pandemic, said Tania Gross, the associate vice president of retention and student success.
Students can access the pantry once a month to supplement a family food supply or grab another bag of needed diapers, Gross said.
Since its opening, the pantry has seen steady traffic outside of a service interruption last spring. Gross said it’s tough to get a good read on whether the pantry has seen more demand since the beginning of the pandemic. The BCTC pantry can also refer students, whose need may exceed what the college can offer, to God’s Pantry. Gross said those referrals have “increased significantly.”
“When they come to us, not all of them, but most of them, their life is already full to the brink. And the first thing they can drop is their education,” Akakpo said. “Think about someone who has kids, who is dealing with a food problem, clothing problem, transportation problem, daycare problem. And on top of that you have the school problem.”