TDNet Discover

The COVID-19 pandemic corresponded with substantial changes in graduate-level online education in the United States. The purpose of this quantitative, non-experimental, longitudinal descriptive study was to analyze trends in exclusively online graduate enrollment before, during, and after COVID-19, and to examine whether the distribution of research doctorate completions across broad fields changed across the same periods. This study used two federal, census-level data sources: the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) Fall Enrollment component and the Survey of Earned Doctorates (SED). Research Question 1 asked: How did the COVID-19 pandemic influence enrollment trends in online graduate education at U.S. higher education institutions? Research Question 2 asked: To what extent did the shift to online learning during the COVID-19 pandemic impact the academic performance of graduate students across different fields of study? For RQ1, an IPEDS analytic file of 15,761 institution-year observations was analyzed using a one-way ANOVA comparing exclusively online graduate enrollment (EFDEEXC) across pre-pandemic, pandemic-peak, and post-pandemic periods, supplemented by a two-way ANOVA examining the joint effects of time period and institutional control. Results indicated a statistically significant difference across periods, F(2, 15,758) = 26.62, p < .001, with a small effect (ηp² = .0034). Post-hoc comparisons showed enrollment increased significantly during the pandemic peak and remained significantly above the pre-pandemic baseline in the post-pandemic period. For Research Question 2, SED doctorate counts (2018–2022) aggregated into broad disciplinary categories were analyzed using a chi-square test of independence. The association between time period and field distribution was statistically significant, χ²(20) = 1134.25, p < .001, with a small effect (Cramer’s V = .030). Standardized residuals indicated over-representation of Engineering and Mathematics & Computer Sciences and under- 3 representation of Humanities & Arts during and after the pandemic period. Overall, findings indicate that online graduate enrollment shifted upward after COVID-19, with post-pandemic levels remaining above the pre-pandemic baseline, while doctoral completions remained largely stable in composition with modest, field-specific variation. Implications include the need for sustained investment in online program quality, adult-learner support structures, and disciplinesensitive doctoral completion continuity planning.