FAIRBANKS -- Enrollment at University of Alaska campuses continued to decline this fall, extending a pattern traced in part by university officials to better job opportunities, the cost of living and a drop in the number of public high school graduates in Alaska.
Unemployment and enrollment tend to rise and fall together, the university says. And both are down since 2010, while the number of public high school graduates in Alaska has dropped and the cost of living in rural Alaska has made it harder to maintain enrollment at some campuses.
UA enrollment peaked in 2012 at 35,138 and has dropped by about 2,500 to 3,000 students since then. The early figures show an enrollment of 28,375 this year, but it is typical for about 3,500 to 4,200 additional students to enroll at some point during the term.
The preliminary numbers released this week show a statewide decline of 3.8 percent compared to the early numbers from fall 2013.
Fewer university students
The headcount at the UAF campus in Fairbanks remained close to stable, with a drop of 25 students from 2013. The 6,159 students enrolled at UAF signed up for 54,106 credit hours, which is 79 credits fewer than a year ago.
Include the community campuses in the mix and UAF shows a 6 percent drop, much of it from declines in Kotzebue at the Chukchi Campus, in Fairbanks at the Community and Technical College, and in Bristol Bay and at the rural college.
Added together, UAF and its branch campuses are down from 9,101 students a year ago to 8,601 this week. There has been a 4.1 percent decline in student credit hours and a 5.5 percent drop in enrollment, which means many of those former students were going part time.
In the state's largest city, enrollment at UAA is down by 669 students, a drop of 4.6 percent, to 13,910 students. The four other UAA campuses in Kenai, Mat-Su, Valdez and Kodiak experienced only a 3.4 percent decline. There was an increase of 149 students in Kenai, while Mat-Su and Kodiak showed little change and Valdez dropped by 38 students.
In Southeast, there was an increase of 46 students, from 3,055 a year ago to 3,101 this year. That was mainly because of a 55-student enrollment jump in Sitka. The number of student credit hours taken by Sitka students dropped, however, from 4,020 to 3,881.
At every campus, the final figures will change as about 10-15 percent of courses start later in the semester. About 60 percent of UA students attend part time and the largest reductions have been among students who are not seeking degrees. In Anchorage, university officials said the number of students not seeking a degree has dropped from 28 percent of the student body in 2010 to 21 percent last spring.
Throughout the state, changes in the high school population have had a major impact in recent years, according to the university. While the state had 6,671 public high school graduates in 2000, a decade later that number was up 23 percent to 8,245.
The number has since dropped to about 7,900 and little change is expected in the short term.
Nearly a third from state high schools
"Decreased fall enrollment of baccalaureate-seeking freshmen for the past several years has been largely due to the decreased number of high school graduates in Alaska," UAF said in a report last spring. "Graduates peaked in 2010 and have been declining since."
About 30 percent of Alaska high school graduates attend the University of Alaska, a percentage that has remained stable since 2010, UA said. The percentage is expected to grow because of programs suchg as the Alaska Performance Scholarship, created by Gov. Sean Parnell and the Legislature to improve college readiness, a spring enrollment review said. The program awards Alaska students up to $4,755 a year to help pay for college.
The requirement of the performance scholarship program that students take at least 30 credits per year by their second year is expected to boost full-time enrollment, the university said.