'We hope this is a one semester glitch': International enrollment is down at CMU
Academic Senate discusses enrollment, new proposal for the general education program
The international enrollment at Central Michigan University is down this year, said President Neil MacKinnon during his report at the Academic Senate meeting on Sept. 9.
CMU had 618 international students who weren’t able to come to campus this fall but are hoping to enroll next semester, MacKinnon said.
“We hope that they still join us,” MacKinnon said. “It does impact us from a budget perspective.
“Anytime you're down in enrollment, there is a budget impact. Generally international students ... would pay higher tuition as well. So, when you're using one international student, the budget impact actually is higher than one domestic student.”
CMU’s international enrollment has been increasing significantly each year since 2022, according to the enrollment report. There were 1,659 international students in 2024.
For the future, MacKinnon said that CMU is working on its strategic enrollment management plan, which would give a five-year guidance to enrollment growth, including international students.
“We hope this is a one semester glitch,” he said. “I think our international students have shown that they love this place. ... They're a big part of our family.”
MacKinnon added that domestic student enrollment is up, but the official census will be shared next week during the Board of Trustees meeting.
In addition, Provost Paula Lancaster said that there’s been a 3% increase in the retention rate over the last year.
“Retention is a university wide effort, and supporting students, supporting their successes, takes all of us, all of us doing work together,” she said and thanked faculty and staff.
Changes might come to the general education program at CMU
Additionally, Benjamin Heumann, a faculty member in Geography and Environmental Studies, presented a general education program proposal.
The proposal outlines 39 to 40 hours of general education, which breaks down to:
- 15-16 hours of foundational skills that include math, oral communication, writing and a new central experience;
- 24 hours of perspectives and inquiry, which include the arts, the big picture, cultures in context, decision making, humanities, natural science, the public good and social science.
“The new part is a central experience, which is going to be a first-year seminar,” Heumann said. “It's going to be one component of this 'learning the science of learning', College 101.
“And we're really excited about ... the big picture. This is a space that's supposed to be for transdisciplinary ideas, the big ideas, the ones that we want students to think about.”
The general education committee finalized this proposal last spring. That's because the university decided to work on improving its gen ed system seven years ago, Heumann said. The proposal's mission is to prepare students for success in their personal lives and professional careers, he said.
"The reason we're doing this is that the faculty and the university care deeply about our students and their experience at CMU and how we prepare them for the future," Heumann said. "General education being one of the biggest components of every student's education at CMU, it's really important, and we want to make sure that we can do the best for our students."
Academic Senate Chair Stephen Juris said the Senators could potentially vote on this proposal in late October.
"We don't have a firm date yet when it would be implemented, but we're looking at many years in the future," Heumann said. "Probably the students who are at CMU right now will not see this program. ... This is a blueprint, but there's a lot of details that still have to be worked out."
