By Jeff Murphy,
August 22, 2017
WARRENSBURG, MO – One week into the fall 2017 semester, the University of Central
Missouri is experiencing growth in two significant areas of focus, new first-time,
full-time undergraduate students and new transfer students.
“Enrollment growth among first-time undergraduates is particularly significant when
considering the heavy competition for the pool of graduating high school seniors,
which has been flat or down in in Missouri in recent years,” said UCM President Charles
Ambrose. “We are grateful for the hard work of our admissions and enrollment management
team who do a great job explaining and showcasing UCM’s excellent value proposition.”
Fall 2017 classes began at UCM Aug. 14. Mike Godard, vice provost for enrollment management,
said as of the end of that week, first-time undergraduate enrollment is up 5.4 percent
over first-time undergraduate enrollment during the opening week of classes in fall
2016. He also added that as of the end of the first week at UCM, the number of undergraduate
transfer students increased 2.7 percent over the same period from a year ago.
Godard attributes increases among new first-time undergraduate and transfer students
to a stronger presence of admissions representatives in metropolitan areas that include
Kansas City, on both sides of the state line, as well as
St. Louis and in Chicago. He stressed the value of aggressively targeting communication
to prospective students. In addition to traditional marketing efforts, UCM admissions
staff spend more time making one-on-one connections with students.
“We’ve done a lot more personal outreach, including telephone calls and text messages.
But most importantly, we are undertaking more outreach to high schools and personally
inviting these students to visit UCM and meet our faculty and experience all that
our campus has to offer,” Godard said.
The Sept. 12 census will provide more exact data related to overall enrollment, including
international students, graduate and undergraduate students, diversity among students,
and more. This data also takes into account off-schedule courses that begin after
the first week of courses.
