SIUC Attendance Update

 According to this updated story, Chancellor Lane did a 180 on his decision to avoid the media and SIUC lost 95 international students year to year. Normally, that wouldn't be significant but as thin as SIUC's enrollment increases have been over the past several years, any drop is going to have an outsized impact. This is also the smallest freshman class since 2022.

As was noted in the comments on the previous post, the drop in incoming students may be due to the lack of attention SIUC administration has paid to facilities over the past 25 years. The last major upgrades to infrastructure were the new student services building football stadium and Arena renovation. There is no real need for the Tedrick Welcome Centeras the student services building could easily serve that function. The Tedricks have donated a lot of money to the university over the years but do not have anything on campus to show for it. A new welcome center is nice but does nothing to fix the leaks in the roof at Quigley Hall or the broken book shelves in Morris Library. Students come here because of solid programs, facilities that support them financial aid. Anything else is window dressing. No student, save for those on athletic scholarship, comes here because of the athletic program. 

SIUC Attendance Flat

 According to this article from the Daily Egyptian, attendance at SIUC is flat this semester, with a 5 person drop to 11, 785. According to the numbers in the press release, attendance would have been up 5 to 10% if not for a significant drop in international students. How large the drop in international students is, the press release did not say.

I found interesting Chancellor Lane's explicit refusal to sit for media interviews about the numbers but then, from what I hear, he does not much care for staying around campus.

SIU Leaders Get More Money

 Given the number of unfilled positions at SIU and that the university still has not seen a consistent increase in attendance during Lane's term in office, a raise for top administration seems a bit pre-mature, especially since the numbers are still less than half the number of enrolled students at its peak in 1990

Chancellor

 Appears SIUC's chancellor is looking for new pastures as Austin Lane is a finalist for the presidency of New Mexico State University. From what I have read, his advancement to finalist rests primarily on overseeing the  first growth in SIUC's enrollment in a decade. Of course the growth was fairly small, about 400 students if I remember correctly. I would want to see a few more years of growth before giving credit to his Imagine 2023 plan. One year does not a turnaround make.