Wednesday, September 3, 2008

UM-Flint enrollment is up

Although the count won't be official until September 10, UM-Flint is on pace to have the largest first-time freshman class in school history. With 890 freshmen, the class is 42 percent larger than last year.

"The record surge forecasted at UM-Flint this fall doesn't surprise many people on campus. Many say the numbers prove that downtown student housing has polished UM-Flint's image and lured a whole new population of potential students," writes Beata Mostafavi in The Flint Journal.

"'More people are looking at this school now. My friends want to come here now,' said freshman Tiffany Hudson, 17, of Detroit and who lives in an on-campus suite. 'I always wanted to go to UM but Ann Arbor was too big.

"'I didn't want to stay in apartments ... and these dorms are nice.'"



3 comments:

  1. Some of the increase in enrollment may be credited to the attributes of Flint and the university, but this is a national trend. The class of 08 is the largest in many years and most colleges are experiencing a surge.

    kathy w.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Kathy,

    Very true. And the dismal state of the U.S. dollar is also making the U.S. very attractive to foreign students. I ran an earlier post on the uptick in foreign students at UM-Flint.

    So this could be a trend or just a temporary surge.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I guess either way, it still provides a nice revenue stream for the university and Flint. However, you have to plan for the famine during the feast, which Flint has never done well.

    Kathy

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for commenting. I moderate comments, so it may take a while for your comment to appear. You might enjoy my book about Flint called "Teardown: Memoir of a Vanishing City," a Michigan Notable Book for 2014 and a finalist for the 33rd Annual Northern California Book Award for Creative NonFiction. Filmmaker Michael Moore described Teardown as "a brilliant chronicle of the Mad Maxization of a once-great American city." More information about Teardown is available at www.teardownbook.com.