Making sense of trends in US international enrollments presents real challenges due to the diversity among ~4,000 institutions. Looking at Oregon State University’s self-identified peer group of four other public universities is an opportunity to get under the surface. It also provides insights as to how private providers offering pathways and direct recruitment support to universities, are contributing to overall numbers and adjusting their programs in an increasingly crowded market.
It’s a small sample over a limited time but it may offer some pointers for universities considering how best to meet their recruitment needs*. Over a four-year period to fall 2018, one of the two public universities without private provider support was competitive in terms of overall international student enrollment. Where a new peer institution was added to the provider’s portfolio during the period it did better than longer-term partners.
Some universities have benefited significantly from partnering with a private provider to bring global recruitment expertise to both pathway and direct enrollment. But some have been less successful and new dynamics are emerging as the sector matures, competition increases and student numbers fall. Where a private provider services several universities with similar academic and ranking characteristics the potential for internal competition for students is likely to increase.
For the university this makes the task of selecting a provider more complex and the consideration of tighter commercial terms on target numbers and non-competing partnerships worth close attention. The lure of having a partner who offers to take all the up-front costs while returning more international students than the university currently has will always be attractive. But the prospect of signing a long-term contract to become a commodity product in an undifferentiated portfolio is less so.
A MIXED PICTURE IN TOTAL INTERNATINAL ENROLLMENTS AMONGST THE ‘ORANGE PEERS’
Oregon State University (Oregon State) defined four institutions as “Orange Peers” for the purposes of its Strategic Plan . Two, Colorado State University (Colorado State) and Washington State University (Washington State) are, like Oregon State, partnered with INTO University Partnerships. The others, University of Nebraska (Nebraska) and Oklahoma State University (Oklahoma State) do not have any private-provider pathway relationship.
A working assumptions of most private pathway provider relationships is that the university will benefit from students progressing from the pathway as well as direct applications as the institutions international profile is raised. Providers have also increasingly focused on recruiting students directly to the university i.e. not just through a pathway, with remuneration often coming as a percentage of tuition fees paid by the student. Looking at an institution’s total international enrollments is one way of considering how the partnership is delivering.
The four-year picture in Table 1 broadly reflects the overall slowing in the US since 2015. However, Washington State had year-over-year growth of 66 students and 46 in 2017 and 2018 respectively, which may reflect the early growth stage of the partnership with INTO which commenced in 2017. Both Oregon State and Colorado State, long term INTO partners from 2009 and 2012, respectively, saw overall enrollments decline in 2018.
Nebraska, which has no private-provider support had the strongest growth over the four years, increasing by 283 students or 11.2%, despite a dip between 2017 and 2018. Oklahoma State fared significantly worst with a fall of 236 students.
The IIE Open Doors report shows that between 2015 and 2017 (the latest comprehensive reporting available) US total international enrollments fell by 0.56%. All of the ‘Orange Peers’, except Oklahoma State, out-performed on that timescale. It will be interesting to see how 2017 to 2018 enrollments compare against the national trend.
TABLE 1 – ‘Orange Peers’ – Total International Enrollments Fall 2015 to Fall 2018
PATHWAY PROGRAMS REFLECT CHANGING CIRCUMSTANCES
Pathway enrollments help underpin direct recruitment to university programs. As global markets change in terms of major sending countries and the demands of students they need to operate flexibly to maintain relevance. As the number of pathways in the US has grown competition for students has intensified.
In June 2018 Inside Higher Education’s Elizabeth Redden took a deep dive into pathway performance as US international enrollments came under pressure. She noted, in particular, a steep decline in pathway numbers at Oregon State driven largely by falling numbers of Academic English students. Fall 2018 data shows that this has continued along with a decline in both Graduate and Undergraduate pathway numbers.
TABLE 2 – INTO Oregon State University Enrollments – Fall 2015 to Fall 2018
At Colorado State one response to the changing market conditions has been a notable increase in the number of pathway courses and the range of academic disciplines covered. In fall 2015 six pathway programs secured 152 students, an increase to 14 programs in 2017 drove a short-term increase to 163 enrollments, with numbers falling back to 142 in 2018 despite a further program being added.
Enrollments on the business pathway program have fallen sharply over the period with engineering enrollments also declining in 2018. New programs in computer information systems, computer science and finance have ameliorated the overall decline. These shifts demonstrate that traditional recruiting patterns are under considerable pressure and raises some questions over whether emerging courses will reach the same volume of enrollments.
Table 3 – INTO Colorado State University Enrollments – Fall 2015 to Fall 2018
At the time of writing it was not possible to find any specific detail about enrollments in the Washington State pathway programmes.
FUTURE DIRECTIONS
US pathway growth continued after new international student enrollment growth peaked in 2016, with around 20 further partnerships by 2019. The ubiquity of pathways has seen an increasing duplication of academic offering and ranking status within each provider’s network. The recent closure of three of CEG’s pathways operations in the US suggests that some partnerships may begin to look sub-optimal over time and that restructuring is likely to happen in the future.
In this new world, well-placed universities looking for partnerships hold a great deal of power to dictate commercial terms or to choose to invest in alternative recruitment options. Locking out competitor institutions, contractually-binding performance criteria and understanding how to exit a failing partnership without penalty should all be considered as part of the commercial terms. There are still many opportunities for the smartest and most creative to do well.
*Data provided by universities is seldom wholly consistent and some provide greater granularity than others. Every effort has been made to make fair and consistent comparisons but any authoritative corrections or comments are welcome.