Enrollment down - cancelled sections a focus

Jason White

The Advocate

Enrollment at Mt. Hood Community College is down about 6 percent this year, President Robert Silverman said this week.

This continues the trend that began with last year’s 14.3 percent drop, according to a report from the Research and Planning office.

“I think we’re about 3.8 percent down in FTE at the moment. Now you could add that we’ve projected 2 more percent so it might really be 5.8,” Silverman.
Silverman said, “Two things are causing it: decreased state support and increased tuition. Those are the two things that are causing this to happen we think.”

Silverman, who is chair for the President’s Council for community colleges in Oregon, said the council is entering into a state-wide study “to try and understand what’s happening [with] enrollment” drops throughout the state.

“The issue here is this state, and [the] people of Oregon, maybe, have constantly said they don’t want to support higher education anymore,” said Silverman.

“We’re sending away 21,000 students because state apportionment has gone down and necessitated tuition to go up. Those are the two [clearest] things now,” Silverman said, based on a study released earlier this week. Silverman posed the question: “Why are 21,000 of your compatriots being sent away?”

“The big issue is sections, and the number of sections we’re offering and what we’re not offering. The sections across the state are all down. Everybody is reducing sections because it’s too expensive to carry too many sections. We’re not the worst, by far and away we’re not the worst,” said Silverman.

“You can run as many little tiny courses, 8-10, and you tell me…if you have a teacher teaching eight students, and the eight students are generating a certain amount of money from FTE and tuition, and you have a teacher teaching 40 students – which one is the most productive, most effective and makes the most money?” Silverman added, “And how many [low-enrolled classes] can you have without going out of business?”“So it’s better not to offer them at all than it is to pay more for the teacher and the cost for the students,” explained Silverman.
But, according to a document submitted by Janet Campbell, an instructor in the Social Science Department, MHCC used to allow faculty to decide whether a class with enrollment of less than 12 students would continue.

She said that often the instructors taught the classes for less pay than they received for teaching high-enrolled classes.

Campbell said the benefits of the old enrollment policy included cutting down on the number of cancelled classes, thereby avoiding problems to student and faculty schedules.

“The college is focused on increasing section sizes. The thought was that this will save [money] by increasing student/teacher ratio.” But she said there is no data to support this claim. “In addition, canceling classes give up all the benefits” from the past enrollment policy, “and increases student and staff frustrations.”

She proposed that “since enrollment growth occurred under the old policy,” reinstating the previous enrollment policy would allow MHCC “to see if enrollment is positively affected, especially since there is no data to show that the new policy actually works.” She said this would reduce faculty and student frustration and add to the intellectual growth of the college.

But, said Campbell, “In examining a 10-year trend, growth has actually been fairly steady, with a growth splurge in 2001-2003.” She said compared to 2003, 2004 enrollment is down, but compared to 1999, 2004 enrollment is fairly steady.

Campbell said, “My only point with this enrollment recommendation is I know the faculty members said it was less frustrating for students and the new policy doesn’t seem to be more cost-effective – and it doesn’t seem to be helping at all. So, why not go back to the old policy, try it, and at least we addressed the level of frustration of canceled classes.”

Campbell said the duty of the administration “is to produce educational products that are as cost-effective as possible and our duty as faculty is to produce a product that is educationally beneficial as possible. Often there is a financial tension there because for [instructors], the lower the number in class sizes the better. Cost-efficiency-wise, this isn’t the case. So, by arguing between the two, hopefully you’ll arrive at a middle position that does an adequate job on both levels. I don’t want to speak for other faculty, but as for myself, while the administration solicits lots of chances for input, it seems like the actual decision-making process isn’t very two-way.”

Asked about Campbell’s thoughts regarding enrollment trends, Silverman said he had asked her for data but had not received anything as of Monday.

“But I’ve never had a personal conversation with him. I think the senate is actually conversing with him about this,” replied Campbell.