The number of college dropouts between 18 and 64 years old swelled to 36.8 million in 2022 — a 2.9% increase over the previous year, according to a report published Thursday.

Among 3,600 colleges sending data to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, the tally of working-age former students with “some college, no credential” grew by about 1 million from July 2021 to July 2022. That figure represents 97% of U.S. institutions of higher learning, with programs ranging from certifications to graduate degrees.

The dropout count covers people who left school for at least 18 months and has increased steadily since the Herndon, Virginia-based research group started tracking it in 2014.

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“It’s a persistent artifact of the higher education system as we know it,” said Doug Shapiro, executive director of the clearinghouse.

According to Mr. Shapiro, 62% of college students finish their degrees within six years and 65% within eight years. There were 17.3 million people enrolled in college in fall 2022 and roughly 146,000 people aged 25 to 64 with a bachelor’s degree or higher.

Of the 36.8 million dropouts at the end of July 2022, the clearinghouse found 2.6% or roughly 943,000 re-enrolled during the 2022-23 school year, with 63% entering different institutions.

From the 2021-22 to 2022-23 academic years, 78,000 more dropouts re-enrolled in college, an increase of 9.1%.

The report’s authors said such numbers make it impossible to say how many dropouts “never finish.”

“There’s always a chance a student could return to postsecondary education,” Jennifer Causey, a clearinghouse senior research associate and lead author of the report, told The Washington Times.

While the report did not explain the reasons for the 2022 increase in dropouts, the clearinghouse pledged to do so in a follow-up study.

Ms. Causey said perennial factors contributing to students quitting college “vary and are unique to an individual’s post-secondary experience.”

“It can be anything from financial complications to administrative barriers,” she said.

The findings come as more high school graduates have struggled since the pandemic to afford, apply for and complete college degrees.

The nonprofit Lumina Foundation co-sponsored the college dropout report. It found in a separate study this year that 37.3% of adults aged 25 to 64 held a bachelor’s or associate degree in 2022, 7.8% had a college-level certificate or certification and 11.1% were college dropouts.

Plummeting birth rates have driven college enrollments down for over a decade, with declines accelerating during the pandemic. According to the Census Bureau, 17.3 million people attended college in 2022, down from 18.3 million in 2019.

The clearinghouse found dropouts increased from July 2021 to 2022 in every state except Alaska, where numbers held steady.

Arizona, Texas, Georgia and Florida led the surge with increases above 3.5% over that period. At the lower end of the scale, college dropouts increased in Illinois and Michigan by less than 2%.

Among students who re-enrolled after quitting college, the report said institutions specializing in online studies were an “increasingly popular” destination. However, students at online schools were also the least likely of all re-enrollees to have finished their degrees two years later.

The report also included breakdowns of “recent stopouts” who left college between January 2021 and July 2022 and “potential completers” who finished at least two years of full-time studies before dropping out.

The most recent dropouts were more likely to be younger and female than others who quit college, the study said.

The “potential completers” were nearly twice as likely as other dropouts to finish their credentials after returning to school. They earned more associate and bachelor’s degrees within two years of re-enrolling.

Asian and White dropouts were also more likely than others to either complete their degrees within one year of re-enrolling or persevere for a second year.

The report noted that Hispanic, Black and American Indian men were “disproportionately represented” among all college dropouts.