Academic Senate discusses plans to address enrollment drop
Executive Director of Admissions Lee Furbeck addresses Central Michigan University's Academic Senate at their Feb. 25 meeting.
With enrollment at Central Michigan University decreasing each semester, new steps will be taken in 2020 to increase admissions.
A new code of ethics and professional practices approved this year by the National Association for College Admission Counseling allows schools to offer prospective students incentives for early deposits and to recruit students who are either already committed to, or currently enrolled in, another school.
To take advantage of this, CMU has made several changes to its recruitment strategy for upcoming semesters, Executive Director of Admissions Lee Furbeck said.
The changes include:
- Making it easier for students to transfer general education credits. To oversee that, a new position in the admissions office was created for transfer outreach and filled by Robert Garcia II.
- Accepting a common application that can be used to apply to multiple colleges. Around one-third of incoming students use the common application.
- Adding staff to out-of-state CMU locations to recruit in areas where CMU has little influence, such as Illinois. This is not limited to America--staff will be hired in other countries to recruit international students.
- More efficient processing of student applications.
- Recruiting students earlier in their high school career, as early as sophomore year for many students.
- Increased print advertising.
- Putting recruiters in charge of specific areas to make recruiting more effective.
In other business, the search for a vice president of student recruitment and retention ended with the appointment of Jennifer DeHaemers.
Planning for the search for a vice president of finance and administrative services is underway. The search committee will be co-chaired by Provost Schutten and Associate Vice President Michael Alford. The search will also be assisted by consultant firm DHR International.
Open forums for the search for chief information officer will be happening on campus over the next two weeks in the Sarah & Daniel Opperman Auditorium.
The position of associate dean of the College of Business Administration has been filled by Dr. Karl Smart.
