By JAN LARSON McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
At a time when many institutions of higher learning are seeing drops in enrollments, Bowling Green State University is managing to bring in more students.
“Bowling Green continues to buck regional, state and national trends,” Cecilia Castellano, vice president for enrollment management, told the BGSU Board of Trustees last week.
“Overall the news is good,” Castellano told the trustees. However, she also knows this sets up BGSU for a bigger challenge next year.
“We are working hard on 2020. We understand our charge is to do it again,” she said.
Castellano reported that overall enrollment of 19,905 at BGSU is the highest it has been in seven years, rising nearly 2 percent from last year. The number of new students is up 5 percent and top scholars are up 14 percent.
“We are pleased to see the continued growth,” Castellano said. “BGSU continues to be a local, regional and national destination for students seeking a world-class education at a great value. Our focus on investing in new academic programs and educational experiences both inside and outside of the classroom is working.”
Here are the numbers:
- Overall enrollment is up 1.9 percent, adding up to the highest enrollment in seven years.
- The total enrollment is 19,905, compared to 19,549 last year.
- The undergraduate enrollment increased 1.5 percent, and is 15,104 this year, compared to 14,861 in 2018.
- The university welcomed 5 percent more new students to campus this fall, from 6,648 last year to 6,985 this year.
- Students are coming from all over, with 80 percent from outside the Toledo metropolitan area. The students come from 30 states, 27 countries and 762 high schools.
- New freshman numbers are up 4.4 percent, from 3,756 in 2018 to 3,922 this year. These freshmen have the highest grade point average in history, with a 3.54 GPA.
- The number of “top scholars” is up by 14 percent. Those are students with an ACT score of 27 or higher, and a GPA above 3.7. The Honors College has seen a 19 percent growth.
- Students of color make up 20 percent of the enrollment.
- Graduate student numbers dropped a bit from 2,682 in 2018 to 2,630 this year.
- The number of transfer students jumped 4.7 percent,from 729 last year to 763 this year.
- The numbers in e-campus and distance learning programs increased 26 percent for undergraduates and 7 percent for graduate students.
But now that BGSU has more students, it must work to retain those students.
The 2018 retention rate was 77 percent, according to Joe Whitehead, provost and senior vice president for academic affairs. That compares to 72 percent in 2010.
The goal is to reach 79 percent retention of the fall of 2019 enrollment.
“We’re looking at strategies so we can increase the retention,” Whitehead said.
Trustees asked Whitehead about the retention rates of other universities. He responded that the colleges that require higher ACT scores, such as Ohio State University, often have higher student retention rates.
“We have to find ways of making students better prepared,” Whitehead said.
BGSU President Rodney Rogers said BGSU’s retention rate is very close to those of similar institutions, but he added, “We believe we can do a little bit better.”
“Great students are coming to this institution. They are succeeding at this institution,” Rogers said.
The fact that this fall’s incoming freshman class has the highest GPA and ACT scores should help, Whitehead said. However, he also added that some students have the necessary “grit” even if they don’t have the grades.
“We have to figure out how we can help all students,” he said.
Also at last week’s meeting, the trustees were told that BGSU has also been recognized as one of the best universities in the country for teaching quality and student satisfaction by the Wall Street Journal and Times Higher Education.
In teaching quality, BGSU ranks No. 3 among all public universities in the country, placing it in the top 1 percent of the more than 800 U.S. colleges and universities analyzed.
BGSU also ranks high for student satisfaction. When asked, “Would you choose your college again?” the number of BGSU students answering “yes” places the university as the No. 1 public university in the Midwest.
“There is no higher affirmation of BGSU’s commitment to student success than the recognition of the quality of our teaching and our students overwhelmingly saying they would choose us again,” Rogers said.
“As a public university for the public good, our mission is to provide our students an outstanding education at a great value. With the leadership of our world-class faculty, we’re helping them design a purposeful and meaningful life so they can succeed both professionally and personally,” Rogers said.
