University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff turns around enrollment

PINE BLUFF, Ark. (AP) - The University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff is turning around low enrollment with new outreach efforts.

The university’s efforts began in 2014, after five years of declining enrollment, with marketing buses that toured the state to recruit students, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette (https://bit.ly/2mME3YZ ) reported.

“It was a rough, rough period,” said Chancellor Laurence Alexander. “It had a detrimental effect on the campus. It’s truly compounded when you have a drop like that so quickly over a short period of time. It’s hard to catch one’s breath.”

In 2015, the university earned a reprieve with an increase of about 5.8 percent to nearly 2,700 students. By 2016, the university saw a 6.1 percent increase to nearly 2,900 students.

“There had been quite a bit of advertising out there by other institutions and, I think, we had kind of lost our place among them,” said Alexander. “It had slipped, and so we had needed to go out and reintroduce ourselves and re-position ourselves with the people of Arkansas.”

Alexander said more students led to internal structural changes. He helped develop the Office of Enrollment Management, which brought recruitment, retention, admissions and student success programs to one facility.

“The recruitment office will recruit students,” said Linda Okiror, associate vice chancellor for enrollment management and student success. “But it’s the faculty and students that can really recruit for a major.”

The university also created an advisory board, made up of faculty members, to call and email students.

Alexander said while the university’s enrollment hasn’t reached the nearly 3,800 students it had prior to the enrollment drop in 2009, it’ll get back on track with a continuous 6 percent increase.

___

Information from: Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, https://www.arkansasonline.com