Education  July 7, 2006

CSU, UNC each expect enrollment to take a fall

Student bodies at Northern Colorado’s four-year universities are expected to shed pounds down this fall.

But these are wanted pounds.

Administrators at both Colorado State University and the University of Northern Colorado are projecting declines in enrollment in the upcoming semester.

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In the case of CSU, the statistics are attention-getting.

Officials at the Fort Collins school are budgeting for a net loss of about 420 students, marking the second straight year of shrinking numbers.

In the fall of 2005, CSU reported total enrollment of 24,410, a decline of 434 students, or 1.7 percent, from the year before. If enrollment falls by another 420 this fall, it would represent another 1.7 percent drop.

The consecutive declines come after a long period of steady growth. Since 1993, fall semester enrollment at CSU had set records every year until 2005.

UNC, meanwhile, is coming off of a record enrollment year, when 12,302 students registered in the fall of 2005 – up 1.7 percent from 2004. But administrators at the Greeley campus are expecting a 1 percent drop this fall, or roughly 125 students.

CSU attributes part of the enrollment drop to a recent increase in students graduating in four years instead of five, which runs counter to national trends.

“That means fewer returning students,´ said Keith Ickes, the school’s vice president of administration. “That’s a positive. We’re pleased to see students getting out in four years. It means we have to recalculate in terms of changing enrollment patterns.”

A serving of good news is that CSU’s incoming freshman class is expected to grow from 2005, Ickes said; the first-year class had dipped by 185 students last year. And future enrollment projections at CSU call for continuing gains, which would be in line with national enrollment trends. Nationwide, enrollment in degree-granting institutions is expected to grow from 15.3 million in 2000 to 18.2 million by 2013, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.

“With demographic trends, there continues to be growth in high school students,” Ickes said. He called the recent decline an aberration.

Furthermore, the school has also made efforts to enhance its student recruiting. CSU recently created the position of vice president for admissions and access, which will be filled by August.

At UNC, which is coming off a string of three straight record-setting fall enrollments, the explanation for the expected dip is different.

“The enrollment of transfer students might be down a little,´ said Nate Haas, a spokesman for the school.

UNC administrators believe more students are staying longer in community colleges, which would pinch the flow of transfers to four-year schools. Also, graduate school enrollment is down at UNC, which could be attributable to tight economic times.

It’s the economy

The economy is a logical reason for declines at both schools, according to Mike Jensen, a Fort Collins developer and landlord who owns about 90 rental units near CSU.

“Over the last five years, with people’s losses in the stock market, things like little Johnny’s and little Suzy’s stash … that was set aside for college has been cut in half,” he said.

Whatever the cause, the impact on local economies in Fort Collins and Greeley shouldn’t be dismissed, said Ed Stoner, president of Old Town Square Properties, which manages retail property as well as 400 rental units. About half of those units are student-oriented rentals.

Stoner hasn’t seen an impact on rental vacancies – he still expects 100 percent occupancy by August. Still, he likened the loss of 800 students over the past two years and their retail spending power in Fort Collins to the loss of 800 service-sector jobs.

News of UNC’s predicted decline is a “huge concern,´ said Steve Reed, president of Property Technica, one of Greeley’s largest rental housing managers.

“Regardless of what you read … there was a huge vacancy factor around the UNC campus last year,” Reed said. “There was a lot of places that were never rented for the entire school year. We’re just overbuilt.”

The numbers also affect school budgets. Even though CSU announced healthy tuition hikes, the revenue gain from tuition will be scant.

CSU’s tuition increases range from at least 2.5 percent for undergraduates to 15 percent for in-state graduate students. Still, because of the enrollment drop, revenue from tuition will only grow 1 percent next year.

If 2006 enrollment matched 2005, then the school would have seen revenue from tuition jump at least 3 percent, Ickes said.

UNC does not expect the same issue. Its tuition hikes are 2.5 percent for undergraduates, 1 percent for out-of-state graduate students and 3 percent for in-state graduate students. However, its tuition revenue is due to climb 4.2 percent. The discrepancy is likely due to the fact that UNC’s most popular colleges – business, music, theater and nursing – all will charge a premium per credit hour, known as differential tuition.

CSU also charges differential tuition in selected colleges – business, engineering and computer science – but the impact of the premiums is less dramatic on the total tuition figure.

Despite the slim gain in tuition revenue, CSU is pouring more money into faculty hires. The school’s governing body authorized funds to hire up to 13 new faculty positions. That will begin the recovery from a sequence of faculty cuts between 2002 and 2004, when the school eliminated about 45 faculty jobs.

“I think the president (Larry Penley) and the provost (Tony Frank) and all of us are looking to find ways to gradually build back those positions,” Ickes said.

Student bodies at Northern Colorado’s four-year universities are expected to shed pounds down this fall.

But these are wanted pounds.

Administrators at both Colorado State University and the University of Northern Colorado are projecting declines in enrollment in the upcoming semester.

In the case of CSU, the statistics are attention-getting.

Officials at the Fort Collins school are budgeting for a net loss of about 420 students, marking the second straight year of shrinking numbers.

In the fall of 2005, CSU reported total enrollment of 24,410, a decline of 434 students, or 1.7 percent, from the year before. If enrollment falls by another 420 this…

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