Rising Importance of Academic Programs

In this brief post about trends in higher education, we explore the growing importance of a student's intended major when choosing a college.

The quality of a student's intended major is more important today than it has been in the past.

• We survey thousands of prospective students every year and the consistency of certain questions allows us to track findings over time

• We compiled the data in the chart above from the 50+ surveys we've done in the past few years

• One observation from our experience: prospective students are placing a growing share of importance on the quality of their intended major

• There used to be an axiom of higher education marketing that undergraduate students chose their school first and their major second

• That may still be true for some, but it's less true today than in the past

• Today, one's intended major is one of the most (if not the most) important considerations, right alongside cost and outcomes

• The irony is that one-third of students enter college undecided and another third will change their majors...but that doesn't matter to the 17- or 18-year-old who is sure they know what they're going to study

  The Implication

  Promoting academic strengths of the institution may not be enough; rather, colleges and universities must do more today to highlight the strengths of individual programs.