"As the traditional May 1 college decision day approaches, admissions leaders have been expressing concern that a significant number of students who’ve paid deposits promising to attend certain campuses will opt against enrolling because of the coronavirus pandemic.
Such decisions could upend the models colleges and universities use to build their freshman classes – and to balance their budgets.
Today, newly released data from polling of U.S. high school seniors suggest admissions officers may have good reason to be worried.
About 12 percent of such students who have already made deposits no longer plan to attend a four-year college full-time, according to the polling. The findings are being shared today by the consulting firm Art & Science Group, which polled 1,171 high school seniors from April 21-24.
Admissions officers always expect some students who told a college they planned to attend not to enroll. The phenomenon has a name: summer melt. Different surveys show summer melt affecting between 10 percent and 20 percent of students." …