More In-State Students, More Grad & Online Students At U Of I Urbana Campus
The Alma Mater statue on the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign campus. University of Illinois Public Affairs
The University of Illinois reports record increases in fall enrollment at its Urbana-Champaign campus. And more of its freshman class is from in-state.
49,339 students are enrolled at the U of I’s flagship campus this fall. That is a 3.2% increase from last year, marking an 8th consecutive year of record enrollment.
Freshman enrollment rose to 7,609, an increase from last fall of 1.2%.
And roughly eight out of eleven freshmen come from within Illinois, another increase.
Director of Undergraduate Admissions Andy Borst says the rise in in-state enrollments is gratifying.
“While out-migration is a concern for this state, it was a nice indicator to see that there are still a lot of highly qualified in-state students who are deciding to stay in-state”, said Borst.
Borst notes that the growth in freshman enrollment at Urbana is smaller than the growth in overall enrollment. He says that’s due to an enrollment strategy that aims to keep the undergraduate population steady.
“And so the record undergraduate (enrollment) is really just a marginal difference from last year. We’re pretty happy with where we ended up. But our intent is to grow our overall enrollment through growth in our graduate and online programs.”
African-American undergraduate enrollment at the Urbana campus increased 1.6% from last year, from 1,973 to 2,005. Latino undergraduate enrollment rose 6.8%, from 3,751 to 4,006.
Graduate and professional-level enrollment at the Urbana campus rose by 1,464 students, or about ten percent.
That includes students enrolled in the university’s online iMBA program, and the 30-or-so students in the initial class of the new Carle Illinois College of Medicine.
Elsewhere in the University of Illinois system, a 3.7% increase was reported in total enrollment at the Chicago campus, from 30,539 last fall to 31,683, a new record for the fourth consecutive year.
Enrollment at the U of I Springfield campus this fall was 4,575, down from 4,956 a year ago. That is a decline of about 7.7%, despite a 13.7% jump in freshman enrollment.