College Yield Drops 3 Percent Since COVID-19

Some students have deferred their enrollment to next year. 

Entrance to the Harvard Office of Admissions and Financial Aid

The Office of Admissions and Financial Aid 
Photograph by Lydia Carmichael/Harvard Magazine

The College’s yield for the class of 2024, or the share of admitted students who indicated that they will attend Harvard, has dropped from 84 percent on May 1 to 81 percent, according to a University announcement made today. Some students have deferred their enrollment until next fall due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which accounts for the drop. 

Last year’s yield was 82.1 percent; the 84 percent yield earlier this year was the highest since the early 1970s. 

First-generation college students make up 18.7 percent of the incoming class, and 22.4 percent of them qualify for the Harvard Financial Aid Initiative’s policy of making the College tuition-free for students whose families earn less than $65,000. The class’s racial makeup is similar to what was already reported about the admitted class in March: 24.6 percent are Asian-American; 13.9 percent are African-American; 11.8 percent are Latinx; and 2 percent are Native American or Native Hawaiian. 

Find more of Harvard Magazine’s reporting on what the fall semester will look like here and here

Read more articles by Marina N. Bolotnikova

You might also like

Nobel Prize recipient Joseph E. Murray dedicated much of his career to organ transplant surgery.

AI Outperforms Doctors in Emergency Room Tasks, New Harvard Study Shows

Researchers say the technology could help physicians with triage, diagnosis.

The Artemis II Mission Included a Harvard Space Medicine Experiment

Wyss Institute researchers are observing how human bone marrow responds to radiation and microgravity.

Most popular

An animal’s journey from grief to love shows how much humans need each other, too.

Meet Harvard’s 2026 Student Commencement Speakers

Two undergraduates and a Ph.D. candidate will address the graduating class on May 28.

Lafayette’s Unexpected Gift to George Washington: Pheasants

The two birds will be on display at Harvard this summer.

Explore More From Current Issue

A woman with long, silver hair rests her chin on her hand, wearing a black top.

Author and Harvard Divinity School writer-in-residence Terry Tempest Williams finds beauty in the world around us.

Star-filled night sky with the Milky Way arching over a rocky silhouette.

There’s a growing movement to curb light pollution. It starts on your front porch.

Two figures stand before a large, colorful pixelated face against a yellow background.

Harvard scientists identify hundreds of genes under selective pressure.