Summer Melt For many years, colleges simply accepted that a certain percentage of an incoming class would not show up in the fall, whether to enroll at another school or just to take a gap year. However, as those numbers grew increasingly larger over the last few years, much attention has been given to recognizing and understanding this trend. We now know it as summer melt. Summer melt is the phenomenon in which incoming college students, already granted admission, take almost every step necessary to complete the college matriculation process and then simply vanish. For myriad reasons, they fail to complete those final few tasks to get in the door and suddenly, up to a third of all admitted, college-bound students find themselves unenrolled. 6
That statistic climbs to 40 percent of students when we look at low-income communities, where many students are first generation and whose parents are inexperienced in navigating the college admissions and financial aid processes. 7
Why summer melt occurs can vary, but a few key factors have been identified as recurring trends throughout the research on this topic:
• After high school graduation, a number of tasks still remain to finalize college matriculation. The inability to receive help from teachers or guidance counselors during those summer months leaves some students lost.
• Students may not know about or feel comfortable accessing support services at the college.
• Some students are deemed ineligible to register because they failed to schedule and attend orientation or take placement tests.
• Dissemination of information via email or a student portal can be confusing or may create a barrier for students who do not have internet access. • Students and their families may struggle to interpret college finances, including deciphering the award letter, meeting aid deadlines, making payments, and budgeting for all costs and unmet needs. 4 In this context, when we look at all the steps students are asked to complete without guidance or without clearly established support systems over these critical summer months, we can begin to understand that summer melt is not so much a phenomenon as it is an expected outcome. The reason that kids drop off in the summer between high school and college is not because of any one big problem. It’s a hundred little obstacles, like pebbles in your shoe. A financial aid form that requires a parent’s signature – easy enough, unless you have a parent who is sick or absent. A document asking students to make a decision about financial aid – easy enough if you have parents or a guidance counselor who can help. An important deadline – not hard to make unless you find yourself in a rural area without a car. 7 – Shankar Vedantam Host of the Hidden Brain podcast
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