YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – Youngstown State University’s spring 2025 enrollment saw a 9% increase compared with last spring, with 11% and 4% bumps in undergraduate and graduate students, respectively.
Mike Sherman, YSU vice president for institutional effectiveness and board professional, pointed to the increase in the number of continuing students, which improved from 6,395 in spring 2024 to 6,722 this semester, a 5% rise.
“So this suggests to me that we’re serving our continuing students better, and they’re being retained from semester to semester at a higher rate,” he said.
Multiple structures initiated over the past few years include a degree audit system and an advising interface.
The number of students seeking associate degrees also increased from 262 last spring to 754 this semester. This is the first spring since Eastern Gateway Community College closed, and YSU saw 357 transfers from that college this spring.
He noted the increase in students seeking associate degrees.
“So adding those associate degrees, obviously, is finding opportunities for students that they might not otherwise have,” Sherman said.
YSU added about 60 associate degree and certificate programs in the wake of the Eastern Gateway closure to serve those who formerly attended the community college.
To try to ensure the upward enrollment trajectory continues, YSU is devising a strategic enrollment plan with different people focusing on its various aspects, Sherman said.
“One group, obviously, is looking at student success, continuation of students in terms of retention, persistence and completion,” he said.
That involves determining how to support students and keep them at YSU once they enroll. There will also be strategies associated with different student groups such as athletics and the honors college, for example, and marketing strategies.
Enrollment involves multiple departments across campus.
Jeanne Herman, associate vice president for strategic enrollment, said enrollment isn’t representative of just admissions and financial aid anymore.
“It’s financial aid; it’s the bursar; it’s admissions;, it’s academics; it’s marketing,” she said. “We all come together, and each one of us brings our piece. It’s not just academics. It’s advising with academics. It’s student success with the registrar’s office. It’s the registrar’s office with the catalog, with the academic programs.”
The university also logged increases in College Credit Plus and international students and those pursuing master’s degrees online. College Credit Plus allows seventh through 12th graders to earn college credit before high school graduation.
The number of international students this semester is 1,273, up from 1,007 for spring 2024. In spring 2023, 668 international students were enrolled. The increase is despite reports of deportations across the country.
“We told our international students that they continue to be very welcome here,” Sherman said.
Before the semester started, YSU President Bill Johnson sent a letter to international students encouraging them to return to campus before classes started, he said.
“We’re advising them to follow the regulations with regard to keeping their passport and their I-20 [certificate of eligibility for nonimmigrant student status] with them, or, at a minimum, to have pictures of those on their phone,” Sherman explained.
“So we’re basically guiding the students, international students, to be successful students at Youngstown State, and that’s what we’ll continue to do,” he said.