Total student enrollment from fall 2013 to fall 2014 is down 2.6 percent, from 28,644 students last fall to 27,889 this fall, according to unofficial numbers released Friday by the Division of Enrollment Management.
This dip is smaller than the decrease in the total number of credit hours taken, however, which only fell 1.5 percent, from 341,898 last fall to 336,618 this fall.
The numbers show that while fewer students enrolled at UNM this fall, the ones who did registered for more classes, said Terry Babbitt, associate vice president for Enrollment Management.
“Undergraduate and graduate students alike are taking higher course loads this fall semester, which is what we want to see,” Babbitt said. “It helps move students toward graduation faster.”
The small dip was not a surprise, due to recent local and national trends of stagnant college enrollment, according to a UNM press release.
The release pointed out that the high school graduating class in New Mexico is at its smallest in recent years, which contributed to an 11 percent drop in first year students coming to UNM. That number fell from 3,518 in 2013 to 3,132 in 2014, according to the press release.
While the number of freshmen is down, their test scores and incoming GPAs are the highest they have ever been, said President Bob Frank.
“While the incoming class is smaller, we will be more likely to keep these students, which will pay off in the long run with more graduates,” Frank said.
The total number of students may have fallen, but the number of students leaving UNM with diplomas in hand has gone up by 12.5 percent over the last three years, Frank said.
While the increase is good news, Frank said the university is hoping to get the number of grads even higher.
“We are increasing the number of degrees we are offering. Not as fast as we dreamed, not as many as we had hoped, but they are increasing,” he said.
UNM produced an increase of 193 graduates, creating an $11 million impact on the state, Frank said. Each UNM graduate earns an average of $40,000 a year, which should help the local economy, he said.
There was some growth in enrollment from a few groups, including engineering and computer science. There were also 200 more international students this fall than last, and the number of transfer students is up as well, according to the press release.
Jonathan Baca is the news editor at the Daily Lobo. He can be contacted at news@dailylobo.com, or on Twitter @JonGabrielB.
