Eastern Michigan University sees growth in number of students, credit hours

EMU enrollment has grown by nearly 7 percent over the last two years, Martin said.

That includes a 2.74 percent growth in the number of students enrolled for the winter semester, compared to the same semester last year. The university has 22,159 students enrolled as of the middle of January.

There’s also been a nearly 2 percent increase in the number of credit hours students are taking compared to the same time last year.

Martin credits that growth to the school’s “zero, zero, zero” campaign, which included no increase in tuition, fees or room and board for this school year.

However, the growth is short of the 3.4 percent growth in credit hours EMU projected it would have in its budget for this year.

Martin said university officials have been looking at the budget for areas of savings to make up any budget shortfall.

“If we can find the nickels and dimes, hopefully that will add up,” she said, adding that the university will see some savings from the budgeted unit price on natural gas versus what it is actually paying.

“We’ve asked everyone to take a look and see where there’s savings,” she said.

EMU officials are optimistic about future enrollment.

Martin pointed out that applications for next year from prospective freshmen are nearly double the number the university had received at this point last year, and applications from transfer students have increased by 31 percent.

"Our application gains reflect Eastern's appeal to a broad range of students at various points in their lives and careers," said Bernice Lindke, EMU's vice president of student affairs and enrollment management, in a press release. "We are seeing spikes in the numbers of applications from entering freshmen, from new transfers and from graduate students. Staff members have been working hard to keep up with the processing."

Martin said no decision has been made on tuition for next year.

She said she hopes to sit down the with Board of Regents in a retreat in the near future to talk about the state’s economy, the budget for next year and other related issues.

“One of the big things we’re going to have to deal with is what’s going to happen to our state appropriation,” she said, adding they hope to know more in February. “That’s a key piece of our planning.”

David Jesse covers higher education for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at davidjesse@annarbor.com or at 734-623-2534.