SIUC enrollment decline continues: Total enrollment down 8.75%
September 4, 2019
This semester, 1,037 incoming freshmen are enrolled at SIU. Total enrollment for fall 2019 is 11,695 students.
This is a drop of 8.75% from fall 2018 when SIU total enrollment fell under 12,817.
“We’ve been up front, for several months now sharing with people that we anticipated [enrollment] being down,” interim chancellor John Dunn said at a Wednesday press conference. “Primarily related to the large graduation class not only in May but also in December.”
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On-campus enrollment for fall 2019 is down 10.29% at 9,597 students, down 1,101 students from fall 2018 and 373 students from spring 2019.
On-campus enrollment first dropped under 10,000 in the spring.
Enrollment on-campus looks at the amount of students who take classes on campus, while the overall looks at students enrolled on-campus, online and in remote locations.
Total SIUC enrollment, 2015-2019.
(See more: Spring 2019: SIU Carbondale on-campus enrollment drops under 10,000)
SIU reached its peak enrollment in 1991 with almost 25,000 students. Since then enrollment has been on the decline.
Last fall, 10,698 students were enrolled on-campus, according to data retrieved from the SIU Registrar’s Office and provided by Jennifer DeHaemers, Associate Chancellor for Enrollment Management.
(See more: Montemagno: ‘18,300 by 2025,’ SIUC sees nearly 12 percent enrollment drop during Fall 2018 semester)
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Both graduate and transfer student numbers remained relatively flat at 2,683 and 1,268 students respectively.
SIU interim chancellor John Dunn said in a university press release he attributes steady transfer rates to efforts to connect with community college partners.
“The picture for first-time students and graduate students is significantly improved over the last two years,” Dunn said, “signalling that we are gaining traction and moving in the right direction.”
Freshman to sophomore retention has increased, according to the release, from 71% last year to 75% this year.
“Enrollment is as much about retaining students as it is about attracting new students,” Dunn said. “We are working hard at both.”
Dunn said the university is focusing on giving students hands-on experience and adding new programs in nursing and business analytics.
Other retention strategies include improving academic advisement, the First Saluki program for first-generation students and the implementation of an early warning system to identify struggling students, according to Dunn’s blog.
“Today, we are beginning to see some of these strategies pay off as we begin the lengthy process of turning enrollment around,” Dunn said.
This story is developing and will be updated as more information becomes available.
Editor in Chief Emily Cooper can be reached at [email protected] or on Twitter at @ECooper212.
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B Wallace • May 27, 2021 at 11:05 am
I went to SIU in the 1980’s The Tuition for a year was $1,300 a year if you lived off campus which I always did. I would apply every year for a Student Loan which back then was capped at $2500 a year, A ISSC Grant and a BEOG or Pell Grant which I always received and I worked part time. I would go down to the Bursars Office every semester and they would hand me a check made out in my name. So I actually made money by going to school. After I graduated I only owed 5K in Student Loans.
Ben macken • May 19, 2021 at 12:07 pm
Sad
Enrollment numbers from when I attended there
Dr. John McLuckie • Aug 10, 2020 at 10:41 am
I did a graduate study on Illinois community college graduates. I collected the data directly from Placement Officers at single campus community colleges on their campuses. In the process I found that must students did not know much about SIU. I put up a few posters with reply cards. Admission office was surprised to get a flood of these cards. This showed that these students did not know SIU was the great place that we know.
SIU had a video that showed a few campuses in spring under snow and SIU students on campus running around in shorts.
Play the video and watch your enrollment jump!
John McLuckie • May 25, 2020 at 1:50 pm
I did a PHD study of Illinois community colleges. I visited all single district CC in Illinois. I found that most of the CC students did not know much about SIU. If you want students then you need to promote and educate students on what SIU has to offer. It is that simple.
I got a lot of CC student feedback from SIU posters that I put up at community colleges.
Dr.John McLuckie
Jim Scott • Mar 8, 2020 at 3:54 pm
I I graduated Southern in 1969 back then it had to be about the cheapest tuition anywhere. We were on the quarter system not semesters. You could take as many hours as you wanted and the full time tuition was about $70.00 or $80.00. We did not have to buy books. We checked them out at the library at the start of the term and took them back at the end. We had about 20,000 students. I know 50 years is a long time ago, but it sounds like tuition and fees have gone up too much. Maybe siu needs some of the old 1969 hippies to help straighten things out
Guido Sarducci • Oct 21, 2019 at 8:19 am
I’m sure the rotting facilities, deferred maintenance, and 50s era dorms are a much bigger contributor than anyone is acknowledging. Maybe new facilites for the students instead of the admins? A shame too. The SIUC campus could be the crown jewel of the state.
Susan Lynch • Oct 5, 2019 at 7:53 pm
As an early 90’s graduate, I was shocked at the recent SIUC enrollment numbers. It’s most likely a combination of factors including demographic trends, total costs, and students’ perceived return on their investments. Clearly the days of sliding into lucrative employment simply by virtue of having a four year degree are over. Everybody has one. I tend to disagree with Mr. Sortal on the aggregate quality of product being delivered by the US higher education system. I simply encounter too many recent grads that don’t seem to have been particularly well served by their colleges / universities. Prospective students should choose their institutions and programs carefully. With current costs, jumping into a four year school without a defined plan, even SIUC at close to $30K/year, can be a recipe for returning to live with one’s parents, under a mountain of debt.
I’d be curious to know the typical debt load carried by a recent SIUC graduate. How is the job market for recent grads? Does the faculty still subject students to mandatory purchases of overpriced, self written texts, used nowhere else on the planet but their own classes? Yeah, I’m still annoyed by that shameless money grab tactic 25 years later, but presumably it happens everywhere. At least I graduated with a very manageable level of student loan debt compared to some of the situations I hear of today.
Connie Starkey • Sep 27, 2019 at 1:05 pm
I see other university’s posters up in Illinois high schools but none for SIU. As an alumni I would personally distribute. Be proactive! Recruit!
Nick Sortal • Sep 5, 2019 at 6:48 pm
Hang in there.
1.) Check out today’s Wall Street Journal. The college rankings had SIU at a respectable 239 out of 500 (the Ivies, etc. chew up the top 50 anyway).
2.)Many of the reasons for enrollment have more to do with state and budget, etc., beyond SIU control. That’s a reason, not a rationalization; I’m sure we still have many things we can do better.
3.) Perhaps with our immediate geography, there are more alternatives to college. That said, all colleges have progressed in recent years and the teachings, activities and overall product is much, much better than when I got my diploma in 1980.
John Renshaw • Sep 4, 2019 at 5:11 pm
I went to SIUC 2001-2005 when they started mandatory tuition and fees increases. This was the beginning of the rapid decline in enrollment. They knew they were increasing cost too rapidly and scaled back the original plan on rate increases. Maybe the administration over the past 14 years forgot the trend they saw during that initial fee increase, but you’d think maintaining enrollment would more than keep up the costs that tuition and fees cover rather than increase cost and lose volume of students. Simple economics if you ask me. Low cost, high volume is better than high cost low volume.
Hugh Williams • Sep 4, 2019 at 4:55 pm
As long as SIUC is treated asan economic engine for the area and not an educational institution, it will continue to have these types problems.
Ken Young • Sep 4, 2019 at 2:32 pm
Obviously, SIU-C cannot charge twice as much money for tuition/mandatory fees as SEMO and expect to increase its enrollment. I do not understand why there is such a disparity in cost between two similar schools. Will someone please explain this to me.