Enrollment Soars at KSU

By Melody Gustafson
EAST LIVERPOOL -- For various reasons, all of KSU's campuses have experienced a surge in enrollment, especially the regional satellites, according to director of student enrollment Shelly Lingenfelter.

Lingenfelter released the official "15 day" numbers as they appeared in the Kent Research Database for the Fall 2009 semester. East Liverpool's headcount is 1241, up 28.7 percent from the 964 at the same time in 2008. Salem campus shows a total of 1587, up from 2008's 1319 for an enrollment upswing of 20.3 percent.

"These are record increases," Lingenfelter said, adding, "We're way up at East Liverpool."

Traditionally, a bad economy tends to boost enrollment at state universities, but this year there are other factors. The quality of the regional KSU campuses has been improving, with the purchase of new equipment and the addition of new faculty members.

Despite the improvements, "Tuition is still relatively low," Lingenfelter said. Regionally, KSU has become more competetive from a financial perspective.

Both East Liverpool and Salem nursing programs, an associate and bachelor's respectively, have boosted the roster numbers more than some of the other programs, and this could be because of the quality of the education prospective medical personnel could recieve through this university.

"There were 80 first year nursing students in East Liverpool this year, and we've never had 80," Lingenfelter said.