SUNY is receiving more applications, but enrollment is still down.
Officials are hopeful that there’s good news on the horizon as it relates to SUNY enrollment.
Earlier this fall state officials announced a ‘free’ period for applying to these universities and colleges.
It worked. More prospective students are enrolling to go to SUNY schools. Applications for next fall are up 72%, according to the Times Union. Applications for this upcoming spring semester are up 20%.
But it’s not all good news. SUNY as a whole still remains on a 10-year decline.
State officials have set enrollment targets at 500,000 students by 2030. That’s more than were enrolled a decade ago when numbers were at their highest. At the end of 2021 enrollment had fallen to 370,000.
Community colleges have taken the biggest hit, losing 87,000 students over the decade.
Among the contenders for lead-ideas to get those numbers up – is enrolling adults who have some college credits but didn’t finish their degrees. Execution on that is a challenge, because many of these students dropped out of college a decade or more ago, making many of their college credits useless.
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