University Times

Pitt-Bradford has reached its long-standing enrollment goal of 1,500 full-time equivalent (FTE) students.

UPB President Livingston Alexander said, “We’re very proud that we were able to reach this milestone three years in advance of our projected time frame.”

This year the campus has 1,535 FTE, a 10.2 percent increase over last fall’s 1,398 FTE. The campus also has recorded the largest total enrollment in its history at 1,657 students — 1,455 full-time and 202 part-time students — and its biggest freshman class of 418 freshmen, an increase of 11 percent over the freshman class last fall.

Also contributing to the enrollment success was a slight increase in the freshman-to-sophomore retention rate to 73.4 percent, the fourth year in a row that number has increased.

Alexander cited several factors to account for the recent rapid growth, including a five-year strategic plan implemented in 2004 that established enrollment growth as a priority. He also pointed to 12 new baccalaureate majors added in the last five years and major improvements to campus facilities over the last decade.

Pitt-Bradford students also are coming from a wider geographic area. The class of 2013 has students from four foreign countries, Washington, D.C., U.S. territories and 12 states, including as far away as Arizona, Colorado and Florida.

The mix of students also favors more traditional students, said James Baldwin, assistant dean of academic affairs and director of enrollment services. “Six or seven years ago, nearly 30 percent of our students were nontraditional students,” he said. “Now that’s about 20 percent.”

According to Alexander, with the achievement of this enrollment milestone, the campus’s physical plant is at capacity.

A new residence hall is expected to open in fall 2010, which will allow the campus to house an additional 103 students. Currently the campus has about 800 beds.

Alexander said the strategic plan calls for additional faculty as well as improvements in classroom and laboratory space, beginning with the renovation of Fisher Hall, the campus’s science building.