August 1,2018
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, According to a story in Philly.com, New Jersey is one of the leading exporters of college students. The website quotes the National Center for Education Statistics in that, in 2016, 31,561 high school graduates left New Jersey for college, while only a mere 4,299 came to New Jersey from other states.
That flight is the largest net loss of students in the country. The New Jersey Business and Industry Association points out that New Jersey taxpayers pay an average of $20,000 per student per year for K-12 education, and, when students leave for college they often don’t come back.
Philly.com pointed out several possible reasons for the exodus for this: the lack of a major city to attract young people, the cost of higher education in New Jersey (the fourth most expensive in the nation), and the availability of many colleges in neighboring states. The problem has caught the attention of legislators, too; the commissioned a study to identify why only 45% of New Jersey students stay in state for college.
