Since reaching a record high enrollment of 19,923 students in Fall 2019, Queens College has experienced a continuous decline in the total number of enrolled students.
“The number one priority we have, which is enrollment, enrollment, enrollment. We’re above 16,000 again. We need that to be at least over 19,000. I have an aspirational stretch goal of 20,000, but if we can get above 19,000 things will be well. 16,000, I’ll be honest with you, things aren’t as good as they should be,” said President Frank Wu at the Oct. 10th, 2024 Academic Senate Meeting.
While QC attributes its enrollment decline to post-pandemic losses, QC’s Fall 2024 enrollment of 15,965 students is not on par with its goal of 20,000 students. So what do these numbers mean for QC services, and what strategies are being used to increase enrollment?
In Fall 2019, QC’s enrollment rose to 19,923 students — the highest it had been in 6 years. Then from Fall 2020 to Fall 2021, with the COVID-19 pandemic, enrollment declined on average among CUNY’s undergraduate senior colleges.
According to QC Provost Patricia Price at the Feb. 13th Academic Senate meeting, QC experienced a 19% loss in student enrollment since the Fall 2020 semester.
Statistics from the Queens College Office of Institutional Research demonstrate that, in Fall 2024, QC had a total headcount enrollment of 15,965 students, a 3.15% decline from Fall 2023. Compared to enrollment statistics from the Office of Applied Research, Evaluation, and Data Analytics’ CUNY Student Data Book, this rate of change is slightly higher than the 3.06% decline from Fall 2022 to Fall 2023.
Over the past five years, CUNY pointed to several reasons why enrollment has declined including COVID-19, waning interest in higher education and a drop in NYC’s young adult population.
In the 2024 State of the University Address, CUNY Chancellor Félix V. Matos Rodríguez described the state of CUNY’s enrollment as “still down more than 10% from where it was before the pandemic.” However, he also stated that 2024 was “the second year in a row CUNY’s total enrollment is up by about 3%. That’s an addition of almost 15,000 students over the past two years.”
On Oct. 9th, CUNY Board of Trustees Committee on Finance & Administration meeting minutes detailed each CUNY college’s headcount enrollment trend in their Fiscal Year 2023-24 Year-End Financial Update. Between Fall 2022 and Fall 2023, QC had a 3.06% decline, the 3rd highest decline among the 10 other undergraduate senior colleges.
So how has enrollment affected QC and what is the college doing to increase its enrollment numbers?
In December 2023, QC’s Vice President for Student Affairs and Enrollment Management, Jennifer Jarvis, gave a statement to The Knight News regarding the importance of enrollment. Jarvis stated, “Our enrollment numbers have a direct impact on the college’s operational budget which supports student services and personnel expenses. The ability for the college to replace employees upon separation and retirement has been delayed. The college will continue to evaluate cost-effective methods to provide the campus community with services to support daily operations that maintain our quality academic standing.”
In a recent request for comment, The Knight News inquired about the consequences of the five-year enrollment declines and what services, if any, have been affected by budget cuts. The college did not address this question.
In a statement given to The Knight News in February, Jarvis shared the measures being taken to increase enrollment this semester, such as “marketing, conversion events (Open House/Become A Knight), campus tours, attendance at college fairs, staff to process applications (Financial Aid and Admissions), scholarships, initiatives targeting transfer students and new student resources.” These initiatives include CUNY Reconnect for returning students, Better Neighbors’s Pathways for Partnership program for transfer students from partnering community colleges, and the Immigration Student Support Initiative for prospective students needing application assistance.
Otherwise, QC’s goal for enrollment improvement includes upgrading student life activities, evaluating options for online and hybrid classes, and strengthening the customer service experience on campus.
According to Jarvis, the measurement of the effectiveness of these programs vary. Whereas CUNY Reconnect evaluates impact through enrollment and graduation data of students in its program, other initiatives like Pathways for Partnership are too recent to collect data for evaluation. However, The Knights News has not received a statement from QC on the numerical statistics for any of the enrollment initiatives in QC.
However, while there are initiatives in place to reach enrollment goals, Queens College has yet to see any enrollment increases.
