Enrollment continues to fall in Pennsylvania’s community of state-owned universities, prompting doubts that the system’s controversial merger of six establishments into two will truly treatment its entrenched monetary issues.
The Pennsylvania State System of Larger Training’s enrollment slid by about 4.6%, from nearly 88,700 college students final 12 months to about 84,600 in fall 2022, persevering with a decade-plus decline.
The drop comes greater than a 12 months after the system voted to consolidate two units of establishments: California, Clarion and Edinboro universities merged to create Pennsylvania Western College, and Bloomsburg, Lock Haven and Mansfield universities grew to become Commonwealth College. The mergers grew to become official in July of this 12 months.
PASSHE Chancellor Daniel Greenstein has argued the 2 merged establishments will assist entice a contingent of untapped college students, together with new grownup learners. He earlier this 12 months set an enrollment goal of including 18,000 college students by an unspecified date.
However that aim appears more and more out of attain.
Essentially the most pronounced enrollment drop this fall occurred at one of many two new consolidated establishments, Pennsylvania Western College, or PennWest. It skilled a virtually 12% scholar decline, compared to the three universities that have been merged to kind it.
PASSHE officers didn’t current the enrollment figures as an indication of doom and gloom. They as an alternative centered on an increase in first-year scholar enrollment systemwide, which jumped by 7%.
The system enrolled 15,649 first-year college students in fall 2022 versus 14,631 the earlier 12 months. Its first-year enrollment in fall 2020 was 16,180 college students.
System spokesperson Cody Jones mentioned in an e-mail {that a} “multitude of things go into any enrollment degree, whether or not that be rising or falling.” Pennsylvania faces inhabitants declines and decreased quantity of highschool graduates, he mentioned.
“However for those who have a look at the info, that is the primary 12 months in a decade when now we have seen an general improve in first-time freshmen,” Jones mentioned. “So the curve is bending, and we’re optimistic about our future.”
The system’s college union and better schooling consultants stay skeptical.
“The elephant within the room is that the campuses are hemorrhaging college students,” mentioned Andrew Koricich, the next schooling professor at Appalachian State College who has studied the system extensively.
A grim image
PASSHE suffers from traits troubling public greater ed at giant: traditionally feeble state funding, a shrinking pool of highschool graduates and a saturated school market.
Mixed, these elements have spelled hassle for the system, which has seen a few 25% drop in college students during the last decade.
The coronavirus pandemic additionally compounded the system’s troubles, and it continues to batter the sector as an entire. Nationwide undergraduate scholar enrollment dropped nearly 5% from spring 2021 to spring 2022, in keeping with a Could report from the Nationwide Scholar Clearinghouse Analysis Middle.
The enrollment information PASSHE offered has holes, which involved Koricich. He famous the system didn’t report sure detailed statistics for PennWest like what number of nontraditional college students it enrolls.
Jones, the system spokesperson, mentioned Wednesday he couldn’t clarify the lacking information factors.
Koricich mentioned the info paints a grim image for the system.
Enrollment at its largest establishment, West Chester College, shrank by about 2%, or 344 fewer college students from the earlier 12 months. Its complete enrollment is 17,296 college students.
For years, West Chester, situated in a rich suburb of Philadelphia, has been the one PASSHE establishment to see constant enrollment progress.
Among the many 10 PASSHE universities, solely two — Cheyney and East Stroudsburg — grew enrollment. And East Stroudsburg’s headcount was basically flat with 16 extra college students, or a 0.3% improve, for a complete of 5,152 college students.
Cheyney, the nation’s oldest traditionally Black establishment that at one level was getting ready to shutting down, obtained 64 new college students, for a complete of 706. This was a virtually 10% improve.
The biggest losses occurred at PennWest and Shippensburg College, which shed greater than 500 college students, an nearly 9% decline for a complete 5,164 college students.
Commonwealth’s enrollment dropped about 3%, or 375 college students. It now has 12,093 college students.
The variety of switch college students from state neighborhood faculties that the system tracks has slid steadily, too, from about 2,923 college students in fall 2017 to 1,779 for fall 2022. This represents a virtually 40% lower.
Koricich additionally identified that Greenstein has made recruiting grownup learners a precedence, however they solely comprise between 5% to 12% of PASSHE establishments’ scholar our bodies in fall 2022. PASSHE defines these college students as undergraduates aged 25 and older.
He mentioned enrollment traits could enhance within the years forward, however “there isn’t any assure it is going to get higher.”
“College students aren’t ready three or 4 years to see what occurs, these are the alternatives they’re making now,” Koricich mentioned.
‘You’ll be able to’t lower your manner out’
PASSHE’s college union, the Affiliation of Pennsylvania State School & College Colleges, already didn’t have excessive hopes the latest mergers would bolster enrollment, mentioned Kenneth Marsh, its president.
The union opposed the consolidation, saying it was too hurried and that slashing sources wouldn’t accomplish the system’s aim of increasing enrollment.
These inside and out of doors PASSHE have pointed to years of state funding as inflicting enrollment declines. With much less state cash, the system hiked tuition charges.
In flip, this boxed out the low- and moderate-income college students PASSHE was designed to serve, consultants say.
State funding woes seem like reversing, although. Earlier this 12 months, Pennsylvania lawmakers gave the system an nearly 16% enhance in working cash, $552.5 million, in addition to a one-time $125 million funding from federal coronavirus help. Greenstein has mentioned the system wanted to exhibit monetary accountability to state policymakers to persuade them to allocate extra funding.
Marsh mentioned uncooked numbers don’t inform the story as to why the system continues to bleed college students. The drop at PennWest is especially regarding, Marsh mentioned.
“You probably have a structural deficit, you may’t lower your manner out of it,” Marsh mentioned. “The one manner out of it’s to develop.”
