Proper institutional planning requires accurate enrollment forecasts. This is especially true in the community college context given open enrollment policies and reliance on public funds. Despite the importance of this task, enrollment forecasts are relatively disconnected from theoretical advances in the study of retention and enrollment. In this…

The School of Management (SOM) at Union Graduate College (UGC) used student trajectories to forecast both individual course and total enrollments within and across various student categories. (The term "trajectory" refers to the enrollment pattern of the average student in a particular category.) The trajectories and the resultant…

At the start of the third decade of the 21st century, the United States is entering a period of unprecedented demographic shifts affecting higher education. Not only are many states already seeing fewer high-school graduates, with more facing this trend as the decade progresses, but in all but a few regions overall population growth will level and…

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, commentators in broadly accessible media have offered a surfeit of predictions about the future of higher education. Due to the absence of accountability mechanisms, however, the accuracy of these claims has been heretofore unknown. Research shows that op-eds and other forms of public scholarship influence public…

College enrollment trends in the United States are a subject of ongoing concern due to the role higher education plays in shaping the future workforce. Enrollment has gone through periods of growth and decline over the past two decades, reflecting changes in the nation's demographics, economy, and views on the value of a college degree. Total…

The Accountability Plan is an annual report that is closely aligned with the Board of Governors' 2025 System Strategic Plan. This report enhances the System's commitment to accountability and strategic planning by fostering greater coordination between University Boards of Trustees and the Board of Governors regarding each institution's direction…

The Accountability Plan is an annual report that is closely aligned with the Board of Governors' 2025 System Strategic Plan. This report enhances the System's commitment to accountability and strategic planning by fostering greater coordination between University Boards of Trustees and the Board of Governors regarding each institution's direction…

As the competition for student enrollment has increased over the past several years, the pressure on the enrollment manager has increased proportionally. Managing enrollment expectations for institutional stakeholders requires effective communication, leadership, and the sharing of data with effective context. This article provides guidance on how…

Institutional staff such as enrollment managers, business officers, and institutional researchers are often asked to predict enrollments. Developing any predictive model can be intimidating, particularly when there is no textbook to follow. This paper provides a practical framework for generating enrollment projection options and for evaluating…

The California Community Colleges Chancellor's Office and the Board of Governors are pleased to release the "2021-22 Five-Year Capital Outlay Plan for the California Community Colleges." To support community college districts grow and improve their educational facilities, the Facilities Planning Unit of the California Community Colleges…

The Accountability Plan is an annual report that is closely aligned with the Board of Governors' 2025 System Strategic Plan. This report enhances the System's commitment to accountability and strategic planning by fostering greater coordination between University Boards of Trustees and the Board of Governors regarding each institution's direction…

The decision to enroll in college is not a single choice but rather the final step of a much longer process in which students make a series of choices regarding how to think about, research, and decide on enrolling. Traditionally, enrollment managers have used the enrollment funnel as a model to focus resources and efforts on acquiring and…

This study developed statistical models to forecast international undergraduate student enrollment at a Midwest university. The authors constructed a Seasonal Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average model with input variables to estimate future enrollment. This model reflected enrollment patterns by semester through highlighting seasonality.…

As widespread restrictions to in-person instruction continue to impact higher education, community colleges in particular are seeing significant enrollment declines. Implications to budgeting, the success of students, and the uncertainty of current and future recessions are challenging enrollment managers across the United States. This article…

While Markov chains are widely used in business and industry, they are used within higher education only sporadically. Furthermore, when used to predict enrollment progression, most of these models use student level as the classification variable. This study uses grouped earned student credit hours to track the movement of students from one…