In a wide-ranging meeting on March 23, the Delta College Board of Trustees was presented with new information about how the COVID-19 pandemic has negatively affected enrollment numbers.
“I’m concerned about these numbers,” said Dr. Lisa Aguilera Lawrenson, Assistant Superintendent and Vice President of Instruction and Planning, as she presented the board with an update on student enrollment at Delta College.
Aguilera Lawrenson highlighted the fact that overall enrollment in the college has decreased by -8.7 percent since this time last year. Both student headcount and course enrollment have decreased significantly since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Enrollment in the spring 2021 semester is down -9.6 percent when compared to enrollment in the spring 2020 semester. Unit enrollment is also down significantly since last year, at -10.6 percent when compared year over year.
Some disciplines have lost significantly more students than others. Physical Education, Dance, Radio/TV, and ESL have all seen their enrollment numbers drop.
Physical Education has seen a decrease from 856 students enrolled in spring 2020 to 363 this spring. This is a decrease of nearly 58 percent. Similarly, student enrollment in Dance courses has decreased from 169 students in spring 2020 to 81 in spring 2021.
Many introductory ESL or English as Second Language courses have seen drastic decreases in enrollment as well.
ESL students are in a unique position than other Delta College students. For many of these students, effectively communicating in English is a challenge in and of itself.
“Offering them a computer from the college and a hotspot isn’t enough,” Lawrenson said when addressing the 32 percent decrease in student enrollment the ESL program has seen in the last year.
Lawrenson said the college is hoping to utilize Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act funding to provide face-to-face instruction for some disciplines in Fall 2021.
The CARES Act is a $2 trillion dollar economic stimulus bill that passed in March 2020.
“It’s really not a stretch to say that we will be offering this face-to-face ESL,” said Lawrenson. “There are some students who just need face-to-face instruction.”
When asked by trustee Dr. Catherine Mathis about the likelihood that Delta would provide synchronous courses this fall semester, Lawrenson reiterated a commitment to get more students back in the classroom.
“We are examining many different possibilities,” she said.
Lawrenson said synchronous learning combined with socially distanced in-person learning is one way the college is hoping to attract an increase in student enrollment this fall semester. These courses would operate both online and in-person by splitting the roster in half and allowing one half to attend in-person, while the other half watched the lesson online.
These two groups would then rotate, and everyone would get a chance to attend in-person lessons at least once a week.
The introduction of new technology in the classroom, like 360° cameras, could help instructors provide their online students with a fuller and more well-rounded classroom experience is also being considered.
