In a time when college enrollments are down across the country, Arizona State University’s enrollment continues to grow.
The ASU president’s Strategic Enterprise Plan presentation was given to the Arizona Board of Regents on Feb. 10, showing that enrollment is up in virtually all respects in spite of the COVID-19 pandemic, while community colleges across the state and universities throughout the country have seen a massive decline.
In the last two years, enrollment has declined 5.1% in the United States, equal to almost one million students because of the pandemic, according to the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center.
The center’s research shows an average undergraduate enrollment drop of 3.1% in the last year, as well as a 3.4% enrollment drop in community colleges.
But ASU’s data doesn’t exhibit the national average decline in enrollment numbers from the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center.
President Michael Crow revealed in the State of ASU Public Enterprise and Arizona State University 2022 update that “total enrollment has continued to outpace goals.”
Nancy Gonzales, the executive vice president and university provost for academic enterprise, discussed community college enrollment declines due to the pandemic compared to ASU’s in the ABOR meeting.
“Even though the Arizona community college enrollment has been declining very substantially, particularly in recent years and particularly with COVID, we’ve been on a continual increase,” Gonzales said during the meeting. “We haven’t been losing ground.”
In the last 20 years, ASU’s total enrollment, which includes both undergraduate and graduate as well as online and in-person students, has increased from just over 50,000 to 135,729, with a projected student body of almost 200,000 by 2026.
Crow said the university’s enrollment is higher than other comparable universities in terms of both graduate and undergraduate students.
“We begin to approach among the larger systems in the country in the traditional sense of the word,” Crow said.
Undergraduate enrollment is the highest it has ever been, with over 100,000 undergraduate students.
In addition to that, the number of Arizona undergraduate residents enrolled at ASU has gone from 32,897 in 2002 to 51,827 in 2021, an increase of almost 20,000 students.
“That’s the building of an entire additional university of Arizona-only students,” Crow said.
The number of Arizona resident enrollees is projected to grow to 60,000 by 2026.
Crow also said not only has undergraduate enrollment grown, but graduate enrollment has as well, reaching close to 30,000 in 2021.
ASU has also enrolled more students of color than comparative institutions and became more accessible to low-income students.
Enrollment of Pell Grant recipients has quadrupled in the last 18 years, and first-generation student enrollment has nearly quadrupled since 2002.
ASU’s first–year retention is nearing its 90% goal, despite a slight drop during the pandemic.
Goals are being met and surpassed for ASU while overall, COVID-19 has slowed down other colleges with retention and enrollment, as shown in National Student Clearinghouse research. ASU has been able to adjust successfully, without enrollment dropping throughout the pandemic.
Looking at the data, however, it is apparent that online students are what is contributing to the growth in enrollment. Since ASU has been working on developing online programs for the last several years, it was well-positioned to continue to grow during the pandemic.
Breaking down enrollment by campus location shows there is no significant growth for in-person students for each campus, especially for campuses with programs that are focused on in-person learning. Downtown Phoenix campus, for example, has steadily had between 11,000 and 12,000 students since 2017. Despite having a small decline during the pandemic, downtown’s enrollment is slightly up since fall 2020, which is notable considering many colleges and universities haven’t recovered from pandemic losses.
“When you talk about how has the pandemic or how COVID has changed up how we do things, I mean our students are hungry for time around us, time with us,” Joanne Vogel, vice president of student services, said during the ABOR meeting. “We have used, I think, technology to our advantage to be able to bring people in who otherwise may not have been able to participate.”
Contact the reporter at emoore24@asu.edu.
Send tips, story ideas and press releases about education to news@downtowndevil.com!
