Quad
Trends by state

Trends by state

New Jersey

49 colleges on the site: 14 public, 30 private nonprofit, 5 for-profit. Their undergraduates fell 6% in total since fall 2014, to 185,263 today (32 of 49 New Jersey colleges in the panel).

Explore New Jersey's colleges

How New Jersey's colleges changed

The median New Jersey college, fall 2014 to fall 2024, against the national median (dashed) over the same .

Undergraduates

-3%

over 10 years, median college

  • This state
  • National median

Applicants

+67%

over 10 years, median college

  • This state
  • National median

Acceptance rate

+8.2 pts

over 10 years, median college

  • This state
  • National median

Average total cost

-12%

over 10 years, median college

  • This state
  • National median

Public and private

State stories are often public-system stories: a state's publics shrinking while its privates hold, or the reverse.

Public

14 colleges
Undergrads
-3%
Applicants
+111%
Acceptance rate
+8.6 pts
Average cost
-12%

Private nonprofit

16 colleges
Undergrads
-6%
Applicants
+48%
Acceptance rate
+7.7 pts
Average cost
-12%

Where New Jersey's first-years come from

Top sending states

  1. New Jersey (in-state)86%
  2. NY4%
  3. PA2%
  4. CA1%
  5. MD1%
  6. MA1%
  7. FL1%
  8. CT1%

Public:

3% → 5% (14 colleges)

Private nonprofit:

18% → 23% (30 colleges)

First-years crossing state lines, fall 2024

Inflow
4,989
Outflow
31,096
Net
-26,107

New Jersey's colleges enroll 0.2 first-years from other states for every New Jersey resident who starts college in another state, among four-year colleges on this site.

Colleges taking the most of the inflow

  1. Rutgers University-New Brunswick22%
  2. Princeton University21%
  3. Seton Hall University9%
  4. Stevens Institute of Technology6%
  5. Rowan University5%

One fall, over campus-based colleges only: not that fall, not for-profit, and not a campus that merged or split.

Biggest movers in New Jersey

The same as the national lists, restricted to New Jersey's colleges.

Applications surged

, fall 2014 to fall 2024

Median college: +92.5% (23 colleges ranked)

  1. 1Rutgers University-Camden+401.4%6,550 → 32,840
  2. 2Rutgers University-Newark+256.1%10,332 → 36,793
  3. 3New Jersey Institute of Technology+226.7%4,777 → 15,607
  4. 4Caldwell University+197.4%3,149 → 9,364
  5. 5Kean University+143.7%5,718 → 13,936
  6. 6New Jersey City University+116.9%2,618 → 5,679
  7. 7Rutgers University-New Brunswick+114.8%31,941 → 68,614
  8. 8Montclair State University+110.7%12,462 → 26,257
  9. 9Stevens Institute of Technology+105.7%5,190 → 10,673
  10. 10Stockton University+101.2%5,229 → 10,520

Sources:IPEDS Admissions survey, Fall 2014 to Fall 2024;College Scorecard (enrollment), Fall 2014 to Fall 2024;IPEDS Fall Enrollment survey (distance education), Fall 2014 to Fall 2024About the data(built 2026-10-12; CPI retrieved 2026-10-12)

Top 10 and how it's ranked

Grew the most

, fall 2014 to fall 2024

Median college: −1.8% (27 colleges ranked)

  1. 1Beth Medrash Govoha+49.0%2,703 → 4,027
  2. 2Stevens Institute of Technology+48.6%2,842 → 4,222
  3. 3Rowan University+35.5%11,692 → 15,841
  4. 4New Jersey Institute of Technology+33.7%6,748 → 9,019
  5. 5Montclair State University+17.2%15,676 → 18,376
  6. 6Drew University+13.1%1,356 → 1,533
  7. 7Rutgers University-Newark+12.7%6,841 → 7,709
  8. 8The College of New Jersey+10.9%6,407 → 7,105
  9. 9Rutgers University-New Brunswick+10.7%34,094 → 37,751
  10. 10Felician University+8.9%1,629 → 1,774

Sources:College Scorecard (enrollment), Fall 2014 to Fall 2024;IPEDS Fall Enrollment survey (distance education), Fall 2014 to Fall 2024About the data(built 2026-10-12; CPI retrieved 2026-10-12)

Top 10 and how it's ranked

Students pay much less

(in 2023–24 dollars), 2013–14 to 2023–24

Median college: −11.7% (26 colleges ranked)

  1. 1Rider University−27.4%$41,117 → $29,872
  2. 2Fairleigh Dickinson University-Metropolitan Campus−27.2%$34,632 → $25,197
  3. 3Kean University−27.1%$29,104 → $21,214
  4. 4Felician University−22.9%$25,927 → $19,980
  5. 5Montclair State University−20.8%$31,993 → $25,329
  6. 6Rutgers University-Camden−19.3%$27,780 → $22,428
  7. 7Centenary University−17.8%$31,367 → $25,794
  8. 8William Paterson University of New Jersey−17.4%$28,795 → $23,793
  9. 9Fairleigh Dickinson University-Florham Campus−16.3%$36,152 → $30,276
  10. 10Ramapo College of New Jersey−14.7%$31,259 → $26,659

Sources:IPEDS Institutional Characteristics survey, 2013–14 to 2023–24;IPEDS Student Financial Aid survey, 2013–14 to 2023–24;College Scorecard (enrollment), Fall 2013 to Fall 2024;inflation: BLS CPI-U, school-year averagesAbout the data(built 2026-10-12; CPI retrieved 2026-10-12)

Top 10 and how it's ranked

Public research universities

New Jersey's public R1 and R2 universities (Carnegie 2025), with their undergraduate change over the same window. No classification in the data means "flagship," so this is simply the state's public research universities.

How this was measured

  • Which colleges. Colleges with 300 or more undergraduates in both fall 2014 and fall 2024: 32 of 49 New Jersey colleges. It's a , so colleges entering or leaving the data don't look like change.
  • Average total cost is an academic-year figure, one year behind fall: 2013–14 to 2023–24, after inflation.
  • Out-of-state shares are collected in even-numbered falls only; odd years are gaps, not zeros.
  • Totals and medians both appear because they can diverge: a state's total can fall more (or less) than its median college when its biggest colleges move differently.
  • No policy attribution. This page shows what changed, not why; a state's mix of public, private, and for-profit colleges, and its system policies, aren't broken out as causes.
  • First-years crossing state lines is a single snapshot, fall 2024, over campus-based colleges only: colleges that fall, for-profit colleges, and campuses that merged or split are left out. It's the newest fall the site's per-college home-state tables cover, not this page's ten-year window.

Sources:College Scorecard (enrollment), Fall 2014 to Fall 2024;IPEDS Admissions survey, Fall 2014 to Fall 2024;IPEDS Institutional Characteristics survey, 2014–15 to 2023–24;IPEDS Student Financial Aid survey, 2014–15 to 2023–24;IPEDS Fall Enrollment survey (part C, residence of first-time students), Fall 2014 to Fall 2024;inflation: BLS CPI-U, school-year averagesAbout the data(built 2026-10-12; CPI retrieved 2026-10-12)