YSU’s enrollment spike reverses five-year trend

A year ago, WE expressed our misgiving about the spin Youngstown State University put on the 4 percent decline in enrollment. The administration contended that the loss of 508 students from the 2014 spring semester was an indication that YSU may be on the right track to stabilize its enrollment dilemma. We didn’t buy what the university was selling.

But today, we adopt a very different attitude with regard to the announcement that enrollment for this spring semester increased by 41 students over last year. To be sure, the increase isn’t a major milestone, but it is significant considering enrollment at YSU has been on the decline for the past five years.

There are 12,361 students on campus today, compared with the 12,320 who were enrolled last spring.

Youngstown State President James P. Tressel, who has made student recruitment and retention a priority since taking the helm in July 2014, is understandably pleased with the turn of events.

“We had gone 15 consecutive semesters, from one to the next, year to year, enrollment went down,” Tressel said Tuesday morning on Vindy Talk Radio. “… And we were really hoping this past fall we’d break that downward trajectory and we ended up, I think, 80 people down. The year before we were like 500 people down, so I mean it was a win, but it wasn’t as decisive a win as we had wanted.”

Tressel’s use of the word “win” isn’t surprising considering that his definition of success is largely built around his experiences as head football coach at Ohio State University and YSU. He led Ohio State to one national championship, and YSU to four.

Those records have made him one of the best known university presidents in Ohio and have served as an effective selling point for student recruitment.

Indeed, the open-access, urban institution has expanded its outreach for students to 60 counties, from the long-standing area of concentration – Mahoning, Trumbull and Columbiana counties in Ohio and Mercer and Lawrence counties in Pennsylvania.

Recruitment strategy

Late last year, Tressel revealed the administration’s student-recruitment strategy.

“ … we’re going to visit not just high schools in October, November and January, we’re going to visit in the evening and invite parents,” he said.

The strategy was bolstered by the hiring of Gary Swegan as vice president for enrollment planning and management. Former President Randy J. Dunn described Swegan as the “guru” that every university needs to take responsibility for all aspects of enrollment.

Swegan said last week the university has worked over the past two years to create a comprehensive and sustainable enrollment infrastructure “that we believe provides a foundation for the continued growth of our student population.”

The vice president said Youngstown State could see an increase in fall 2016 enrollment, which has been declining since 2010.

In addition to Tressel and Swegan leading the charge, the student recruitment effort is getting an assist from Royall & Co. of Richmond, Va., a direct marketing student-recruitment company.

Last year’s cost was about $300,000, which was generated by the president through a fundraising campaign. The university extended the contract with Royall for another year, and the $500,000 cost was built into the university’s budget.

Tressel is well aware that in these times of tight higher-education budgets – from the standpoint of the institutions and the students – results matter. Spending a half-million dollars at a time of no-growth funding from the state for colleges and universities can only be justified by an increase in enrollment.

YSU has a lot going for it, including its low student cost, an internationally recognized Science, Technology, Engineering and Math college and a nationally respected Dana School of Music.

And from a marketing angle, it has a national rating from Forbes.

Last August, Forbes published its annual “America’s Top Colleges” listing, which included Youngstown State among the 650 institutions it believes stand out among the four-year public and private universities and colleges.

There are more than 2,000 institutions of higher learning in the United States with a combined enrollment of 10 million-plus.

It is no small feat, therefore, to be recognized as one of the best.

As we said at the outset, the increase of 41 students this semester compared with a year ago is by no means a major milestone, but it is progress. For that, President Tressel and his team deserve to take a bow.