Student Enrollment Statistics Released

The nursing department, which draws a large number of students each year at Southwestern, will soon move from Hagen Hall, shown here, to the proposed building that will be located near Miller Hall.

The official enrollment numbers for the 2015-2016 school year have been released by Southwestern Adventist University. This data lists the student population by their classification level, chosen field of study and religious preference. These numbers are evaluated and collected to formulate the “Financial Full-Time Equivalent” enrollment, or FFTE.

Various departments that comprise the University use these numbers to determine not only budgets, but also to examine how well these departments are performing overall. According to Tom Bunch, director of institutional research for Southwestern, a department might find that, “a decrease or increase in enrollment over three years may mean some adjustments in the courses offered and maybe even the number of full-time or part-time faculty in the department.”

The most populated academic program on campus continues to be the nursing department, which contains 201 out of Southwestern’s 803 total FFTE students. The education and psychology program holds 105. The growth of the nursing department reinforces the need for the new nursing building on campus beginning next year.

“If we are looking at trends then the enrollment by department by student classification (freshman, sophomore, junior, senior) are very helpful as to where in the four years are our majors positioned. For financial purposes, the FFTE is very important,” says Bunch.

This information has been shared with all of the various faculty and staff of Southwestern Adventist University. It is now up to them to decide what changes may need to be made and what might need to be prepared for in the future.

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