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NAU Town Hall Outlines Student Enrollment Projections

Northern Arizona University

In an online staff Town Hall yesterday, administrators at Northern Arizona University discussed enrollment issues in the wake of campus-wide budget cuts and the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. 

Vice President of Enrollment Management, Anika Olsen, said up until the Fall of 2018, student enrollment at NAU was tracking well. But by the Fall of 2019, enrollment had leveled off and started to decline, the first time in years the university saw a drop in student enrollment numbers. 

Olsen said the coronavirus pandemic presents complex economic challenges regarding enrollment, especially when it comes to out-of-state and international students, who generally pay more tuition to NAU than in-state students. 

With 50 days left until the start of the Fall semester, NAU officials say they would need to enroll 85 student per day to meet pre-pandemic levels of flat enrollment numbers.