Class sizes diminish with low student enrollment
Threatening the number of instructors as well as the integrity of the College of Eastern Utah, the problem of low enrollment begins to appear in class sizes. These figures were cited in a document released by Institutional Research Coordinator Kim Booth for spring semester 2007.
CEU is a community college and is meant to be a school that maintains a more personal atmosphere; however with 310 classes with less than 10 students enrolled, CEU is not holding the minimum traditional requirement to keep the classes eligible to attend.
This archived article was written by: Benjamin Waldon
Threatening the number of instructors as well as the integrity of the College of Eastern Utah, the problem of low enrollment begins to appear in class sizes. These figures were cited in a document released by Institutional Research Coordinator Kim Booth for spring semester 2007.
CEU is a community college and is meant to be a school that maintains a more personal atmosphere; however with 310 classes with less than 10 students enrolled, CEU is not holding the minimum traditional requirement to keep the classes eligible to attend.
The document shows that there are 193 classes that have fewer than five students enrolled. Moving even lower in the statistics, the document shows there are 48 classes in which there is no one enrolled.
Although many of the statistics show that there is an extreme low in class enrollment, the document also had classes regarding high enrollment.
In physical education, weight training I had over 212 students enrolled when adding sections together, and considering that this can be a two-semester course, the class preceding, weight training II, ranked moderately good as well, with over 50 students enrolled.
Next in line for highest enrollment, is service learning, with over 80 students enrolled.
With high and low numbers, this batch of statistics did more then just its initial duty in showing each individual class. Through numbers, it also reveals each department’s enrollment spring semester.
According to the document, the program in which most students are enrolled in, granted that a student may take two separate classes within the program, would be the physical education department, tallying over 700 students which is over half of the college’s full-time student enrollment.
With over 18 courses available and a total of 481 students enrolled for all combined, English classes come second to PE for most students enrolled. Although most every course in this department is needed for graduation, there were a few that contributed to the high enrollment that were not mandatory for an associate’s degree.
According to the report, classes such as “literature by woman” enrolled over 20 students. Along with this course, others such as “introduction to fiction”, “introduction to poetry” and “creative writing” support the English department’s enrollment with over 30 students.
Following the English department, the math department ranked second for highest enrolled bringing in 363 students. The same case scenerio in the math department whereas many of the classes in this department are needed for graduation for an associate’s of either art’s or science’s degree.
Such classes representing this department other than that needed to graduate included “calculus I”, “calculus II”, and “calculus technique,” which enrolled over 50 students.
Another department proving that departments can maintain a high enrollment is the criminal justice department. With over 226 students enrolled, most of the classes offered contain over 20 students.
The document also reports that programs such as “electrical apprenticeship” and “cosmetology” are bringing in over 20 students each.
Although there were classes that maintained high enrollments, there were various departments that did not hold a high enrollment number.
The lowest of which is the museum department, with only two students enrolled and only one class offered.
With nearly 30 classes offered, dance also comes into the spring semester with a low student-to-class ratio, with enrolling just over 100 students in the program. Over 20 classes offered had less than 10 students enrolled.
The art department had much of the same problem, although enrolling more students than the dance department with an enrollment number of 134, the ratio was much lower than that of dance; 20 out of the 23 classes in which are offered do not have more than 10 students enrolled.
According to the document, the language department also has a low number of students. With three languages offered including English as a second language, the department has 44 students enrolled total. The student-to-class ratio is the as low as the museum department, showing only one class, “first-year Italian,” that has more than 10 students.
