Future of Division III

[CNU85]

Demographic report

Here is some information from a study/report published December 2024. Figure 32 on page 67 also shows college enrollment rates of high school graduates.

Excerpts:

"News reports and policy briefs routinely refer to the pending decline in the school-age population as "an enrollment cliff." While the cliff metaphor is useful to illustrate the impending demographic shift for policymakers, the reality will be a slower and steadier decline, which has important implications for institutions of higher education, workforce training systems, and state and federal policymakers."

"Postsecondary enrollment has been dropping for several years, even as the number of high school graduates has been increasing. If higher education collectively cannot ensure its relevancy, demonstrate its value to students, and improve student outcomes like retention and completion, these demographic trends will exacerbate the existing enrollment trends, leading to substantial drops in the number of students, increased workforce shortages, and fundamental financial difficulties for many tuition-dependent institutions."

[DagarmanSpartan]

But it only has about 6,500 undergrads, which is certainly small in the grand scheme of things.

If you are going for the grand scheme of things, you have to look at overall enrollment.  In terms of resources and reputation, the University looks very different without a major medical school, law school and so on...

Still not large even when considering that.

12k is pretty small for an R1 research university.

See Illinois and Houston (both R1 schools with medicine, law, etc) for reference.

[DagarmanSpartan]

Demographic report

Here is some information from a study/report published December 2024. The only thing I could not readily find is any hard figures on the trend of high school graduates who enroll in college. Perhaps it is in the report. I just couldn't find it. I will look at the reference figure indicated and see if I can find something.

"News reports and policy briefs routinely refer to the pending decline in the school-age population as "an enrollment cliff."11 While the cliff metaphor is useful to illustrate the impending demographic shift for policymakers, the reality will be a slower and steadier decline, which has important implications for institutions of higher education, workforce training systems, and state and federal policymakers."

"Postsecondary enrollment has been dropping for several years, even as the number of high school graduates has been increasing.74 If higher education collectively cannot ensure its relevancy, demonstrate its value to students, and improve student outcomes like retention and completion, these demographic trends will exacerbate the existing enrollment trends, leading to substantial drops in the number of students, increased workforce shortages, and fundamental financial difficulties for many tuition-dependent institutions."

I think that that is correct.

This "the sky is falling" demographic cliff that people here are talking about that is supposedly coming this year or next year is not correct.

[DagarmanSpartan]

As for the future of D3, stop panicking.

A few schools may collapse, and a small number will be very negatively affected.

Fearless prediction: it won't significantly affect the future of D3 as a whole.

[WUPHF]

Millikin is adding Women's Flag Football and Wrestling.

The future of Division III is more and more and more varsity sports and I like it.

[WUPHF]

Fearless prediction: it won't significantly affect the future of D3 as a whole.

Debates over definitions for things as trivial as the word significant have long been the norm on the d3boards.

It comes down to how you define significant.

[Flying Dutch Fan]

But it only has about 6,500 undergrads, which is certainly small in the grand scheme of things.

If you are going for the grand scheme of things, you have to look at overall enrollment.  In terms of resources and reputation, the University looks very different without a major medical school, law school and so on...

Still not large even when considering that.

12k is pretty small for an R1 research university.

See Illinois and Houston (both R1 schools with medicine, law, etc) for reference.

I suspect your arguments might carry a little more weight and promote more discussion if you would stick to only discussing D3 schools.  This entire system of websites (D3hoops, D3football, etc.) and this discussion board exist for that purpose - to discuss and promote D3.  It's really not that hard to stick to D3 here!!

[Gregory Sager]

Millikin is adding Women's Flag Football

That makes three CCIW schools that will be inaugurating women's flag football programs next school year: North Park, Illinois Wesleyan, and Millikin. CCIW sponsorship of the sport is right around the corner!

Actually, an Illinois-only D3 league could be set up for the sport for next fall. Aurora, Blackburn, Eureka, and Illinois College will each take the field for the first time in that sport in 2026-27, so right away there could be a seven-team circuit in which each member is pretty much at the starting line. Plus, north of the Cheddar Curtain there's several D3 schools that will also be debuting the sport next school year: Beloit, Lakeland, Marian, Ripon, and UW-Oshkosh.

The IHSA already holds championships in the sport for girls, and over 200 Illinois high schools currently have flag football teams.

[Pat Coleman]

With no championship and no AQs in place, there probably isn't a big need for a lot of affiliate sponsorships. Plenty of opportunity for these schools to schedule each other that I don't know if it needs to be formalized as of yet.

[WUPHF]

Illinois College has a co-ed clay target team. I had no idea...

[Gregory Sager]

With no championship and no AQs in place, there probably isn't a big need for a lot of affiliate sponsorships. Plenty of opportunity for these schools to schedule each other that I don't know if it needs to be formalized as of yet.

Oh, I don't think it needs to be formalized yet, either. But I think it would be good to formalize a league, whether it's actually necessary or not. I can think of three reasons right off of the top of my head:

1) standardizing a lot of the scheduling, which would make it easier on the coaches (most of whom are rookies when it comes to running a program and thus have enough on their plate with which to deal);

2) branding, which would collectively establish the presence of these schools for recruiting purposes; and

3) trophies and awards, because it's always good to have something to play for beyond the final score at the end of the game. Nothing says, "You're a bona-fide varsity sport now, not merely a club team," than having a championship trophy that can go in the school's trophy case and/or a banner to hang in a gym or stadium, alongside all of the school's other permanently-displayed varsity triumphs, since I have yet to see a college or university honor a club sport in that way.

[WUPHF]

Greg, was there an independent men's volleyball conference in the Midwest before the CCIW and others began sponsoring the sport?

[Gregory Sager]

Yes, there were several -- but they were very broadly midwestern, and they even spilled beyond the borders of the midwest, because there was such a shortage of D3 schools that sponsored men's volleyball until the late '10s.

North Park played its first season of varsity MVB in 2019 as an independent, and it quickly became viewed at NPU as a ramp-up season to get the program up and running once the CCIW as a whole decided to begin sponsoring MVB competition shortly after North Park had decided to add the sport. The CCIW began sponsoring the sport in 2020. The only CCIW school that really has a long varsity pedigree in the sport is Carthage, which started intercollegiate varsity play all the way back in 2005; all of the other schools in the CCIW that had MVB teams played at the club level (North Park's club team started in the late '60s). Carthage went through an entire alphabet of acronyms in terms of the leagues in which it partipated prior to the inaugural CCIW season of 2020: the MIVA, the M-III, the CVC, and the MCVL. And their league opponents included such far-flung schools as Thiel, Wittenberg, Adrian, Olivet, Fontbonne, even UC-Santa Cruz.

Getting back to women's flag football, the historical precedent that I have in mind in advocating for a women's flag football league is the old Chicago Metro Conference. Back in the early '80s when I was a North Park student, it was becoming obvious that Title IX as well as growing interest among girls in competing in sports on an intercollegiate level were creating a burgeoning demand for women's sports teams at every higher-ed institution, including within D3, and that the sort of piecemeal, throw-them-a-bone-by-letting-them-play-a-few games way of allowing them to compete wasn't going to cut it any longer. Since the CCIW presidents had yet to all agree upon making the conference coed in terms of competition -- because it only sponsored men's sports at that time -- the four Chicagoland CCIW schools plus Carthage got together with a couple of other local schools and started the Chicago Metro Conference for women's volleyball, women's basketball, and softball as a means to fill those felt needs that I spoke of in my previous post: standardizing scheduling, creating a brand to draw the interest of local high-school female athletes, and providing a means for rewarding female student-athletes at the CMC member schools by giving them a chance to win championships and awards.

It only lasted for four years -- 1982-83 thru 1985-86 -- before the nine CCIW presidents acquiesced and decided to have the league sponsor women's sports, leading to the immediate dissolution of the CMC. The interesting thing is this: the CMC won three national championships. North Central won the D3 women's basketball title in 1983; Elmhurst won the D3 women's volleyball title in 1983; and then Elmhurst won the D3 women's volleyball again in 1985. Three national championships in two different sports over the course of four school years for a league that only sponsored three sports is not too shabby!

Thinking back on the CMC really sells me on the idea that all of these women's flag football teams popping up now deserve that same sort of competitive experience.

[WUPHF]

Thanks Greg!

[Caz Bombers]

Wesleyan is moving to the NAIA.

No, not that Wesleyan, the other one.

https://www.naia.org/general/2025-26/Releases/Fall25-New-Members