Albrecht speaks of aspirations, student goals
Public education is essential in helping students establish the ambition, goals and commitment needed to enroll in college and also to stay and graduate, USU President Stan Albrecht said Thursday.
“The kind of preparation that our students bring with them is critical in terms of addressing retention issues,” Albrecht said.
Albrecht spoke to a room of about 145 faculty members and advisers at USU’s first Retention Symposium about ways to attract students and keep them in school once they are here. The symposium, sponsored by the office of Retention and First-Year Experience and the office of the provost featured workshop sessions, panel discussions and the keynote address by Albrecht.
Albrecht said young people generally don’t decide to attend college when they’re 18 years old, so getting students prepared and properly informed must begin early.
Although enrollment this semester is at a record high, retention has been an increasing concern for the university, he said. Between the 2002-2003 and 2004-2005 academic years, there was a significant reduction in enrollment numbers, and the university lost about 700 full-time students, Albrecht said.
Some of the reasons students leave are to serve missions, get married or transfer to other universities, but many choose to leave for financial reasons, Albrecht said. Out of 1,600 students contacted by telephone who had stopped attending USU, he said about 950 cited financial reasoning behind their decision.
“It’s not an unhappiness with the institution or the environment in which they find themselves,” Albrecht said. “Most students say that in making the decision again, they would still choose to come to USU.”
Albrecht said while many people compare the rising costs of tuition to other expenses such as health care, prescription medicines or the purchase of a new car, the rise in tuition costs are dramatically higher.
From 2001 to 2007, tuition costs at USU rose 70 percent, he said. This semester, there are more than 17,000 full-time students enrolled at USU, and the freshman class has 683 students more than it did two years ago, Albrecht said.
“What we have seen is a significant reduction in state investment in higher education resulting in a need on our part to find other ways to do what it is we’re doing, and one of the ways to do that is to increase tuition costs,” Albrecht said.
Next to comparison universities, though, USU is still one of the lowest in terms of cost of tuition, he said.
“We are still a good bargain,” Albrecht said. “We are 19th out of 20 western institutions in terms of tuition and fee costs for a student coming here.”
While it is important to recognize that, Albrecht said, the university must still be concerned about retaining students who are having financial difficulties.
Albrecht said the university plans to focus next on increasing endowments so it can, in part, provide resources to help take care of the students who are dropping out for financial reasons.
-bri.jones@aggiemail.usu.edu