Summary
According to the U.S. Census and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service (ERS), in 2021 there were 46 million people (13.9% of the entire U.S. population) living in rural areas. Among the population aged 25 or over, 21.1% of the rural population had earned a bachelor’s degree or higher. This rate is up from 17.2% in 2010, but falls well below the rate of 35.7% for the non-rural population.
Though there is data on rural postsecondary institutions, there is a significant lack of information on students from rural areas. The most comprehensive data come from two sources: nationally representative longitudinal surveys from the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) and the National Student Clearinghouse (NSC). NCES data in this factsheet comes from the High School Longitudinal Study (HSLS), which tracked high school freshmen in 2009 into and beyond postsecondary education.
