MCC hits record high for spring enrollment

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KAHULUI - Maui Community College enrolled 3,309 students this spring, an all-time record number for the Kahului campus, and boasted a 16 percent increase, the largest percentage jump in additional students of the seven community colleges in the University of Hawaii system.

"For us, it's very heartening," said Suzette Robinson, the college's vice chancellor of academic affairs. "The hope is this will be the beginning of a momentum."

Despite tough economic times - or maybe because of them - the University of Hawaii system is reporting record numbers at its community colleges for spring semester 2009.

Just short of 51,000 students have signed up for the spring semester across the university system's 10 campuses, up 5.6 percent from a year ago.

MCC's newest enrollment numbers represent the first time that the school has seen a spring enrollment exceed 3,000. In comparison, spring 2007 drew 2,597 students and last spring had 2,852.

"The surge (this spring) is the biggest we've ever seen," said Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs Alvin Tagomori.

Katie McMillan, MCC's director of marketing and community relations, said that the college's spring enrollment was the highest ever in the school's history. It also marked the first time a spring enrollment exceeded the previous fall's, in this case by 16 percent.

She said the school's newest students should be commended for pursuing higher education despite the island's economic downturn.

"This is really great news for Maui. I think it's all about turning something negative into a positive," McMillan said.

As the economy crumbles, more people are seeing the need to train for a difficult employment market, university officials say.

''I think what we've got are people who are either underemployed or have lost their job who have decided to come and get education and training,'' said Linda Johnsrud, university vice president for academic planning and policy.

She said enrollment goes up when high school graduates face a tough job market, and the economy pushes more Hawaii students to stay closer to home.

''The average age is going down slightly, so that tells me that it may well be that we have more young people coming out who find there are less appealing jobs immediately after high school without any additional training,'' Johnsrud said.

Community colleges are showing the biggest gain - more than 9 percent - while the university's main campus at Manoa on Oahu shows a slight decline, with 50 fewer students than the 18,818 registered last year. But that was offset by a gain of more than 2,750 students on other campuses.

''Community colleges offer a wide variety of training,'' said Lawrence ''Bill'' Boyd, a university labor economist. ''Investment of time in improving future earnings is what is driving the logic.'' He also noted the lower tuition at community colleges.

At Maui Community College, a class costs $71 a credit, a price that remains below the average cost for community colleges of comparable size.

Susan Lee, university director of marketing communications for the community colleges, credits some of the increase in enrollment with advertising aimed at drawing working adults back to school.

''When this whole economy went down, people started getting laid off, it was this particular market that we were targeting. Many of our ads resonated with them,'' Lee said.

McMillan and others from the MCC campus also made the effort to visit every high school not just in Maui County, but in the entire state to let younger students know about programs and possibilities.

Maui became an attractive option for Hawaii families who found Mainland colleges unaffordable and saw that student housing was available through the Kulanaa'o Apartments on Vevau Street near the Kahului Public Library.

"We're making an effort to really get ourselves out there," Tagomori said of marketing the college to students.

He said online registrations have also helped with students living outside of Maui.

Robinson said that while marketing and access to registrations were important factors in spurring enrollment, so was the offering of programs that responded to community surveys showing interest in career and technical education as well as business and vocation programs.

Robinson said results from one of the most recent MCC student surveys also showed trust and respect for faculty as being important to students.

"I suspect people are seeing MCC as an education value. They see our faculty as caring, highly competent and well-educated," she said.

Robinson said the increase in student enrollment should also be credited to Maui County, which appropriated $500,000 this fiscal year to support nursing program faculty, enabling instructors to accommodate new students this spring.

Robinson said the increase in students has had an overall positive effect at the school. "The energy here has picked up. You can feel it on campus," she said.

While the University of Hawaii's spring enrollment breaks a record set in 1995, the all-time peak was reached in the fall semester when 53,509 students registered. The spring total is 50,952.

* Claudine San Nicolas can be reached at claudine@mauinews.com. The Associated Press contributed to this report.