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On Monday, the Community College Research Center (CCRC) released its analysis of the new IPEDS data on high school dual enrollment.

High school dual enrollment is playing a growing role in the enrollment gains of the past few years. The financial picture is more complicated: serving these students can be difficult to sustain financially. It’s a good news, bad news situation—increased access and enrollment, but potentially tighter finances. That makes the relatively new IPEDS data and CCRC’s coverage particularly useful. Read the full analysis and explore their data tools.

There is a specific question I’d like to explore using our own analysis: how much of the recent growth in undergraduate enrollment comes from dual enrollment, and what does the overall recovery conceal about growth or decline among other undergraduates?

Data notes:

From CCRC:

Nearly one in four community college students is still in high school.

High school students also make up a growing share of undergraduate enrollment in the public four-year and private nonprofit four-year sectors.

Nearly one in ten undergraduates at public four-year institutions is a high school student (9.3%), as is roughly one in fourteen at private nonprofit four-year institutions (7.1%).

The next question is how much this changing enrollment mix contributes to the recovery—and whether total enrollment growth conceals declines among other students. Here I separate dual enrollment from all other undergraduate enrollment, the group CCRC calls “post-high-school.”

Let’s look at the change from 2022–23 to 2024–25, broken down by sector.

High school students account for 9.3% of undergraduate enrollment at public four-year institutions, but 47% of those institutions’ enrollment growth over the two-year period came from dual enrollment. At public two-year institutions, dual enrollment accounted for 42% of undergraduate growth.

Across all institutions included in this analysis, 38% of undergraduate enrollment growth over the past two years came from high school dual enrollment students.

Sector totals can hide important differences among individual colleges and universities. Public two-year institutions with the largest increases in dual enrollment show several different patterns of overall growth.

Among public two-year institutions, the largest increases in dual enrollment reveal different kinds of enrollment recovery. Ivy Tech added roughly 16,000 dual enrollment students alongside 8,600 other undergraduates, with dual enrollment accounting for 65% of its total growth. Dallas College’s gains were more evenly divided, while Illinois Eastern Community Colleges grew primarily through non-dual enrollment. At Western Technical College, College of Southern Idaho, Arapahoe Community College, and Sinclair Community College, however, dual enrollment gains offset declines in other enrollment. These institutions all grew overall, but the underlying changes in their student populations were quite different.

Public four-year institutions with the largest increases in dual enrollment also show substantial differences in where their growth came from.

A quick note—CCRC shows that there was underreporting of dual enrollment in the initial 2022-23 data set, so the U Conn growth numbers may be inflated.

The public four-year chart shows that this pattern extends beyond the two-year sector. At the University at Albany, dual enrollment accounted for 94% of undergraduate growth; at Utah Valley University, 95%; and at Tarleton State University, 93%. Central Washington, Eastern Washington, and Missouri State University–Springfield increased their total enrollment even as non-dual enrollment declined. Other institutions, such as Miami Dade College and Indiana University–Bloomington, added substantial numbers in both groups. The distinction matters: growing undergraduate headcounts can reflect broader enrollment gains, expansion concentrated among high school students, or dual enrollment gains that offset declines elsewhere.

The increase in US higher education enrollment over the past few years is important, and dual enrollment is a substantial part of that recovery. But the same headline growth can reflect very different situations. State policies and institutional strategies shape how much colleges rely on high school students: some are expanding enrollment among both high school students and other undergraduates, while others depend on dual enrollment gains to offset declines elsewhere. Rising headcounts tell us that enrollment is growing; they do not, on their own, establish that colleges and universities are recovering financially or becoming more stable.

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