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Free tuition programs don’t always lead to higher enrollments or degree completion, according to a new study published by Brown University’s Annenberg Institute.
The study compared two last-dollar tuition guarantee programs for community college students in Pennsylvania, which has one of the lowest in-state college-going rates in the country. It found that one initiative did not significantly increase enrollment, while the other appeared to incentivize students to enroll at a two-year institution over other four-year options.
The report’s authors found that advertising “free tuition” was not enough to get new students to flock to higher education, especially those who may not have pursued college otherwise.
“Our analyses suggest that a tuition guarantee, by itself, will not necessarily have any impact,” they wrote in the paper. “If a program falls in the forest and no one hears it, it will not shift enrollment patterns.”
