SIUC Enrollment Declines (again)

 For the umpteenth year in a row, SIUC posted a decline in attendance , this time 2.8% to 11,366. Administration says this is a good thing, since the drop is far smaller than the 8 to 12% drops of previous years. Still a drop though, no matter how you position it: "We are still sinking, just at a slower rate". Here is hoping the plans the current administration puts into place turns things around. What SIUC could reallyuse is someone in charge who remains there for a decade, so that they can develop and implement a long term plan.

Enrollment Down

SIUC Chancellor John Dunn announced 10 day enrollment numbers today for SIUC and they do not look good:  11,695. That is less than half when I first came to Carbondale back in 1990 when enrollment peaked at about 24,000

Roger Herrin

Yesterday's Southern has a lengthy column on SIUC Board of Trustee's chairman Herrin, highlighting his conflicts with University President Glenn Poshard and other board members.  Given the 9% decline in attendance at the university this summer, I found this comment by Herrin interesting:

He (Poshard) knows the university isn’t doing any good, and he will ultimately have to perform,” Herrin said. “Whoever the board members may be, they are going to expect improvement. I want to take this university back to where it was. With some changes at the administrative level, we can turn it around very quickly.

Given the 20+ year of declines in attendance, I really doubt if changes at the administrative level are enough to turn the university around very quickly. You cannot easily turn around an organization with over 14,000 employees on a dime.  ITo do so would require massive shakeups in management, especially at the top level and the university shows no sign of doing that.

Turning the Corner

Once again, the university is turning the corner in terms of enrollment, though the corner it is is turning is backwards, with enrollment down about 1.1 percent, compared to increased involvements at both SIUE and SEMO.  Hasn't the university been turning the corner for over 10 years now?

SIUE Growth

Was talking with a friend who teaches at SIU-Edwardsville and he says the general feeling is that, if current trends at the two universities continue, SIUE will exceed SIUC in student enrollment within 5 to 6 years. When that occurs, the general feeling is the administration will, citing admission trends, push for separation from SIUC and status as an independent institution, something that, according to him, faculty and staff "desperately" want.

Valle Out

Looks like two weeks was enough time for new Chancellor Cheng to deceide that three years was enough time for VC for Enrollment Management Victoria Valle to get enrollment numbers up, something at which she's consistently failed, though the university has been on the verge of turning the numbers around, oh, every semester for the past decade. I see the university still sees salvation in going after out of state students, despite the fact that those states have universities that go after the same students as well. Have't checked recently but the last I heard, SIUC made really anemic attempts to recruit students from the southern Illinois region.

SIUC Down

Several stories on SIUC's drop in enrollment, esp. compared with SIUE's increase. Here, here, here and here, to name a few.

SIUC Retention

I think this means that retention for the spring to fall semester is up, though 10,216 students registered for spring at this time compared to 12,885 at the same time last year doesn't sound like much to celebrate to me. Also, this was an interesting paraphrase from the Chancellor:

Chancellor Sam Goldman said at the executive session of the SIU Board of Trustees meeting Wednesday he believes the university’s retention problem has been tackled.

Given the enrollment trends at the university for the past 20 years, I don't think one semester is enough to consider the problem "tackled".

More on SIUC Enrollment

The DE follows up on what I noted a couple of days ago, attendance is down at SIUC and up at other institutions. Quotes from the article indicate SIUC is going to get right on this, you betcha. Fifteen years of slow but steady decline is not going to get fixed in a semester or even two and I hate to break it to 'em, but online courses will not make SIUC any more compeitive. You have to have an institution people want to attend first, then they will start taking your online courses.