The Enrolment Puzzle in Higher Education

The enrolment in higher education institutions has been dwindling for the past few years. It wasn’t gauged to be anything serious. A routine alteration between a crest and a trough. As it touches critically lower levels now, it nudges Director Colleges to come out with an SOS call to principals of all GDCs:  “We have been witnessing a major decline in student enrollment across all the disciplines for the last few years,” further adding, “and we need strategies for addressing this major issue.” This resonates, nonetheless, with a Mayday call. 

Why are students taking this risk of not enrolling in Higher Education in the times of education boom? What prompts them to take a risk to forgo hitherto prized higher education admission? Is the college enrolment now, for them, a bargain of loss? Earlier the students would plead for admission, and now institutions are imploring. 

The clear statistics to this effect are not available officially, but as I burrowed into the search rabbit hole I zeroed in on the following data.  I borrow this statistical excerpt from ‘Kashmir Life’ to attest to the alarming trend: “In 2022, the Government Degree College in Ganderbal had 1700 admissions and in 2023, it has fallen to around 700. Beerwa College had a fall from 493 to 311. In Sogam (Kupwara) the college got 513 in comparison to 689 in 2022. Khansahab College in Budgam enrolment fell from 300 to 167. In Handwara College the numbers nosedived from 963 to 577. A Woman College in Srinagar got 145 students in 2023 in comparison to 220 in 2022.” The same is true for the University of Kashmir as I burrowed further. Kashmir Times report reads, “In a concerning development, Kashmir University’s stark decline in student enrollment, with a significant number of vacant seats, raises alarm about the growing “academic aversion” among youth”. “The situation is no different in other prestigious universities of Kashmir”, reads the report.

For UG enrolment decline some blame CUET examinations. Well, if that were the case, wouldn’t students and parents have flooded the colleges seeking admissions outside of CUET? The colleges did create a non-CUET window to facilitate admissions. Did that help? Not as expected. Others blame NEP-2020 major-minor mumbo jumbo. Major-minor, to my mind, is not that tricky a jargon that could prevent the greater mass of students from joining colleges. Would mere labels and appellations of courses wean students away from higher education programs? Providing flexible entry and exit options should have given a fillip to courses. Something more serious is going on. 

Before I delve into the nitty gritty, let us not forget one major factor that has altered significantly the mindset of students. That is COVID-19. It has been a mammoth disruptor. In education, it effected two major disruptions: one, a temporary systemic disruption, by forcing the closure of all educational institutions during COVID waves. The second disruption, and a relatively permanent one, that took off albeit late, was the ‘perceptual disruption’. The old belief/perception of physical sites (colleges & universities) as the exclusive sites of knowledge has given way to multiple/alternate (usually online) sites of knowledge. And the effect of this perceptual shift firstly led to increased absenteeism (a different kind of absenteeism than normal) of students from colleges and universities. It is this kind of absenteeism that has, subsequently, morphed into decreased enrolment. Before the Director of Colleges tries to woo more students to the colleges he must see to it that the students who have already enrolled in different colleges find the curriculum and teaching on the campus far more satisfying than what is offered to them elsewhere. A restaurant must first be able to tickle the discriminating palate of its clients eating there before it expects to woo more crowd to the restaurant. 

Having the post-COVID-19 perceptual shift of students in view we will attempt to analyze the different yet significant kind of absenteeism. I would prefer to call it ‘purposeful absenteeism’ because by intent it is purposeful & genuine. In this case of absenteeism, as against normal absenteeism, students stay away from classes because they primarily feel that some other alternate site of knowledge or meaningful activity is more important than attending the classes. Purposeful absenteeism is not normal absenteeism or bunking that we have been used to. Normal absenteeism was easy to fix. It had no purposeful and genuine intent behind it. It is ab-initio inappropriate, and students too do not defend this kind of absenteeism. Our case in point is purposeful absenteeism which may be illegal considering our institutional statutes, but from the perspective of its intent & purpose, it is genuine from personal standards as well.  Now let’s see in what ways this ‘purposeful absenteeism’ has worked in our system to hand us decreased enrolment.

Purposeful absenteeism for better knowledge: Given the Post-COVID perception in students they seem to stay absent seemingly because they feel there are alternate or better sites of knowledge than the institutions they attend. Here, students may be leveraging other accessible and flexible sites of knowledge. And if they are accessing other sites of knowledge and risking absenteeism then it means other competing sites of knowledge and skill (mostly online) have eaten into our space as competitors, and sooner, it seems, they could effect a greater decline in enrolment. This kind of absenteeism is quite genuine and, hence purposeful because students have the right to access the source of knowledge at will and as per their requirements. If you still, as per your institutional statutes, want to keep them tied to attendance and classes, they, in all probability, will choose not to join the institution. Hence, the enrolment deficit.  Here, as it is clear, Higher Education will have to enhance its academic & professional wherewithal if it wishes, first and foremost, to keep its already enrolled students happy, and then expect to attract more students to the campuses. Why would students attend a college when there is a faculty deficit? The faculty deficit in the colleges is alarming. Furthermore, the conventional way of conducting classes won’t help. Students already get much better lectures online. The conventional way of handing them ‘notes’ too is already finished. We are in the era of Chatgpt & AI. Most of our teachers may have technology handicaps, new-age youth have none. So why will they attend your class? Our system is too thirsty for ‘idle attendance’ without making equivalent improvements in classroom transaction. We do threaten students with shortage notices yet students are seen adamant to relent.  What does this mean? Quite simple. 

Purposeful absenteeism for economic reasons: In this case of purposeful absenteeism, the students feel there is a greater need to earn than just attending classes in a college. If you make them attend classes on regular basis, they will lose their earnings. So they prefer absence. Furthermore, in changed conditions, a standard conventional kind of program may attract those students who are fully funded from home and who aspire for greater erudition, but for all and sundry, who have bread-and-butter issues, something different has to enter into the scheme. Sometimes purposeful absenteeism could be resorted to by a student both for knowledge and employment at the same time. Now colleges/universities need to think about it. Is it possible to allow students to earn while they learn?  

“The data from the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) revealed that Jammu and Kashmir had one of the highest unemployment rates in India, ranging from 23.1% to 24.6%, significantly higher than the national average of 6.1%. This high unemployment rate is also reflected in the disproportionately large number of applications for the limited number of government positions whenever they are advertised. Due to the lack of a robust corporate culture, many educated individuals in the region remain unemployed while attempting to pass government job exams. Consequently, when they are unsuccessful, they become part of the ‘educated unemployed’ group” (JK Policy Institute). This paints a very grim picture of employment. 

What next: Higher Education needs to be cognisant of these pressing issues of students to ward off their urgency for ‘purposeful absenteeism’ that is wrecking the system. If the purposeful absenteeism issue is addressed other issues will fall automatically in line. Doing that may require a greater academic shift. Higher Education & Universities have already taken initial steps in that direction. DYD (Design your Degree) programs launched could be one best example of this shift where only ‘constructive attendance’ matters and experiential learning strategies are deployed. Many universities have already launched it, and IASE, Srinagar could launch it from the current session. This program is innovative, very open, and flexible, and discounts traditional idle attendance. Students enrolled in such courses could be allowed to earn as well. The earning sites, where they work, could be linked up with some of the courses already availed by the student, making them part of their internship. Online earning options like digital marketing, drop shipping, and content writing among others could very be leveraged in such a program. 

Second, some short and skills-specific courses could also be envisaged to enhance academic reputation and diversify course offerings. Some short unconventional courses from DYD bouquet could be offered separately like ‘mathematics in everyday life’, ‘disruptive strategies’, ‘working with data’, ‘problem-solving from scratch’, ‘world through AI’, Technologies of the future, Internet of Things (IoT), Digital Humanities, and many such courses tied to internships could significantly attract students. 

Third, campus life, without doubt, is an undervalued area in Higher Education. What else do we offer to our students other than normal classes? Our curriculum begins and ends with a classroom. What kind of academic support like mentorship programs or academic advising and career counseling workshops do we conduct? What kind of financial support services, and educational loan services are available on campuses? Do we offer part-time job assistance/internship assistance or industry networking events? Personality development, leadership programs, soft skills, goal setting, and planning in a minds-on and hands-on workshops must come with the course as complimentary. Student organisations and clubs for socio-emotional learning must be given paramount importance. 

Upping this professional wherewithal is quite an uphill given how difficult and slow the reform catches up in the welfare-based systems. Whether Higher Education responds to these issues or not, students have already made a detour: flexible online/distance education with a side hustle. A perfect combo!