The University of Minnesota Crookston’s preliminary, first-day enrollment numbers on August 25 were 1,774 undergraduate students and 672 non-degree seeking students including Post-Secondary Education Options (PSEO) and College in the High School (CIH). On-campus enrollment fell 15.6 percent from 784 to 622, while online enrollment increased 5.4 percent from 1,055 to 1,112. Non-degree seeking enrollment is down 27.7 percent from 929 to 672. Total full-time degree-seeking and part-time enrollment is down 11.4 percent from 2,768 to 2,452.
While the numbers are still preliminary, this appears to be the largest cohort of incoming online students in school history. UMC Chancellor Mary Holz-Clause said that enrollment was slightly higher than expected with COVID-19. “The on-campus enrollment numbers are slightly larger than expected after COVID-19 adjustments were made,” said Holz-Clause. “We watched the number of online student numbers continue to grow over the summer,” added Holz-Clause.
Director of Enrollment Management Mike Griffin said UMC has set aggressive goals for online enrollment, “while some of this may reflect some students shifting online because of COVID-19, we set aggressive goals to grow online numbers last fall and we see potential for strong continued growth in the future.”
More than 500 students are from the Twin Cities metropolitan area and 1,300 plus are from Greater Minnesota. There are more than 80 students online and on-campus from outside the U.S.
The official enrollment statistics for all the University of Minnesota campuses will be available in early October to account for late registrations or movement of students among colleges and campuses in the first weeks of the semester.
Holz-Clause, along with UMC Vice-Chancellor John Hoffman, talked about enrollment and many other subjects regarding UMC on KROX’s Valley Talk Monday. That full interview is below:
