Hello infopros-ga,
I trust you had a good weekend.
Here's the data I mentioned earlier.
A good deal of the information you are seeking can be found in a
single table buried (deeply buried!) at the US Department of
Education's National Center for Education Statistics website:
http://nces.ed.gov
The actual table is Table 172:
Total fall enrollment in degree-granting institutions, by attendance
status, sex of student, and control of institution: 1947 to 2000
which can be found here:
http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d02/tables/dt172.asp
The full table breaks out the data by full and part time status, as
well as by gender...I have included these data here in case they are
of interest.
They key data of interest to you are the total enrollments for each
year, and the breakout by non profit enrollments (public + private
non-profit), and the comparison with private for-profit enrollment.
The overall enrollment figures for the past ten years are as follows:
YEAR...Total Enrol...Full Time....All Private..Private...Private
.............................................non-profit..for profit
1990 ....|13,818,637 | 10,844,717 |2,973,920 |2,760,227 | 213,693
1991 ....|14,358,953 | 11,309,563 |3,049,390 |2,819,041 | 230,349
1992 ....|14,487,359 | 11,384,567 |3,102,792 |2,872,523 | 230,269
1993 ....|14,304,803 | 11,189,088 |3,115,715 |2,888,897 | 226,818
1994 ....|14,278,790 | 11,133,680 |3,145,110 |2,910,107 | 235,003
1995 ....|14,261,781 | 11,092,374 |3,169,407 |2,929,044 | 240,363
1996 ....|14,300,255 | 11,090,171 |3,210,084 |2,940,557 | 269,527
1997 ....|14,345,416 | 11,146,155 |3,199,261 |2,961,714 | 237,547
=====================================
[because of some changes to survey methodology, data for 1996 and 1997
are repeated in Table 172 with slightly different results from the
numbers above...the table then goes on to present data for 1999 and
2000]
1996 ....|14,367,520 | 11,120,499 |3,247,021 |2,942,556 | 304,465
1997 ....|14,502,334 | 11,196,119 |3,306,215 |2,977,614 | 328,601
1998 ....|14,506,967 | 11,137,769 |3,369,198 |3,004,925 | 364,273
1999\ .|14,791,224 | 11,309,399 |3,481,825 |3,051,626 | 430,199
2000.....|15,312,289 | 11,752,786 |3,559,503 |3,109,419 | 450,084
You can see that the enrollment in "Private for-profit" institutions
has more than doubled during this period from 213,693, to 450,084,
while the growth in the much larger non-profit sector has been
considerably slower. Total enrollment increased from 13.8 million in
1990 to only 15.3 million in the 2000-2001 school year.
==========
Another source of information is Table 174:
Total fall enrollment in degree-granting institutions, by attendance
status, sex, and age: 1970 to 2012
http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d02/tables/dt174.asp
Which presents projected enrollment data for 2001, 2002, 2010, and
2012, although the numbers are not broken out by non-profit and
for-profit status. The enrollment numbers are:
2001..........15,442,000
2002..........15,608,000
2010...........17,185,000
2012...........17,673,000
==========
The breakouts by 2-year and 4-year institutions are in Table 173:
Total fall enrollment in degree-granting institutions, by control and
type of institution: 1965 to 2000
http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d02/tables/dt173.asp
The data show breakouts by public vs private colleges, but don't
specify whether the private institutions are for-profit are
non-profit:
Year............Total 4-yr...............Total 2-yr
1990.............8,578,554................5,240,083
1991.............8,707,053................5,651,900
1992.............8,764,969................5,722,390
1993.............8,738,936................5,565,867
1994.............8,749,080................5,529,710
1995.............8,769,252................5,492,529
1996.............8,802,835................5,497,420
1997.............8,874,676................5,470,740
[note that slightly different alternative data for 1996 and 1997 are
given in the table, just as was the case in Table 172]
1998.............9,017,653................5,489,314
1999.............9,198,525................5,592,699
2000.............9,363,858................5,948,431
==========
Some additional trends on profit vs non-profit enrollments can be seen
in Table 180:
Fall enrollment and number of degree-granting institutions, by
affiliation of institution: 1980 to 2000
http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d02/tables/dt180.asp
which shows the total for-profit enrollment of 450,084 in 2000, and
breaks it out as:
193,130 Full time, men
172,546 Full time, women
40,856 Part time, men
43,552 Part time, women
==========
The Department of Education statistics would undouubtedly allow some
addition ways of slicing and dicing the avialable data. For instance,
Table 180, that I mentioned above, also provides the number of
students enrolled according to the religious affiliation of the
schools attended.
The full list of data table available for enrollment figures at the
college level can be seen here, listed as tables 170-222:
Chapter 3. Postsecondary Education
http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d02/list_tables3.asp#c3a_1
You may wish to explore these a bit, as they are a rich source of information.
I hope this information provides you the preliminary sort of overview
you were looking for.
Before rating this answer, please let me know if anything is unclear,
or if you need any additional information. Just post a Request for
Clarification, and I'll be happy to assist you further.
pafalafa-ga
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