Penn Highlands board hopes enrollment dip a temporary blip

Jun. 16—Enrollment at Pennsylvania Highlands Community College continues to trend downward.

"I think we're doing everything that we can to get students in," President of Student Affairs Trish Corle said at Tuesday's board of trustees meeting.

The college wrapped up the 2020-21 school year, affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, behind by about 7% compared to the previous year.

Steve Nunez, college president, said after the meeting that his team is still trying to figure out what people want and why many aren't signing up for higher education, noting that all community colleges across the state are experiencing the same woes.

One reason he offered for the downturn is that high school classrooms were closed to visitors this past year.

That lack of in-person time may be affecting enrollment.

"We do an exceptional job at selling our values when we're one-on-one," Nunez said.

The decrease in students has carried over to upcoming terms as well.

Corle told the members that summer enrollment is down by about 11%.

However, she said comparing that term to last year isn't looking at "apples to apples."

Corle said the college saw a number of students drop off in the spring semester for one reason or another and pick up their studies again in the summer, which caused an increase.

Looking ahead to the fall term, Corle said Penn Highlands is starting to catch up, despite being down by about 14% at this time.

"Usually after Memorial Day and all the graduation things are over, we start to see students come in," she said. "My folks are reporting to me this week that they're starting to see more traffic, more inquiries coming in — students moving through the pipeline."

Additionally, the inquiries- to-applicants conversation rate has improved.

Nunez is hoping for a surge at the end of the summer, but is still left scratching his head about the situation itself.

"We're trying to figure it out because it doesn't follow the normal trend," he said.