2008 Woodie Awards
Classes Not Keeping Up With Enrollment
Mindy Shuman
Issue date: 10/1/04 Section: News
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"I was upset when I found out there were no more available English classes," said Peggy Vang who started her first semester at the Marysville campus this fall. "I plan on majoring in English."
Originally wanting to attend college full time, she was also unable to register for the history class she wanted, reducing her schedule to part time.
In a bid to improve state funding, Yuba College has pushed to increase enrollment. Funding from the state is determined by calculating a college's FTES, or Full Time Equivalent Student, enrollment. One FTES point equals 525 class hours of student activity in credit or non-credit courses, roughly 12 units.
FTES is calculated for a college by adding together the total amount of units from all students and dividing that number by twelve. Yuba College's numbers come from all campuses, outreach courses, TV and online classes for the fall, spring and summer sessions. Last year, student enrollment and the college's FTES were down.
Unfortunately, low FTES tends to mean fewer courses offered which means fewer students will enroll, or as in the case of Vang, students take fewer units, lowering the FTES even more. It is a vicious cycle.
Yuba College has this academic year to make up the numbers without compromising its funding. Last year falls under what is termed "a year of forgiveness," but if the college does not bring FTES totals up, the amount of state funding will drop. The college's FTES goal for this year is 7,769.
The college hopes to meet its goal by the end of spring. If it does not, the summer sessions may be added to either the previous or following academic year. This past summer session, which earned us 561 FTES, will be used for the 2004/05 academic year, and if necessary, next summer will be as well.
Dr. Alan Lowe, the Vice President of Instruction for the district, hopes adding next summer session won't be necessary. "Five hundred and sixty one is the FTES we generated during summer. We're using that as our base for 2004/05. If we can make 3,589 in each of the two semesters, plus the 30 flex, that gives us 7,769."
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