
DATE: Wednesday, September 10, 1997         TAG: 9709100498

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY MATTHEW BOWERS, STAFF WRITER 

                                            LENGTH:   93 lines

TCC THRIVES WITH NEW CAMPUS COLLEGE'S 17,479 STUDENTS AT 4 SITES TRANSLATES INTO GROWTH OF 14 PERCENT

The people in charge say Tidewater Community College's average-busting, 14 percent enrollment growth so far this fall comes under the maxim ``if you build it, they will come.''

And if you advertise it.

And if you call them back, asking why they didn't come the first time.

TCC's increase in enrollment far outstrips overall statewide growth in Virginia's 23-school community college system, estimated by state officials at about 2 or 3 percent this fall. Official state numbers won't be available until later this month.

Preliminary figures from TCC that don't include later-starting courses and some programs taught for specific industries show 17,479 students taking courses on its four campuses, some 72 percent of them on a part-time basis.

That is 1,841 or 11.8 percent ahead of the same time last year, if they're counting heads. But TCC and state community college officials count ``full-time equivalent'' students, measured by credit hours taken. A full-time student is defined as one taking 15 credit hours, or about five classes.

Counting the credit hours being taken, that makes 9,628 ``full-time equivalent'' students at TCC so far this fall, an increase of 1,208 or 14.3 percent.

Higher enrollment is good for TCC and other community colleges. Their budget allotments from Richmond are based on the number of full-time equivalent students they serve. More students means more money, and more money means more classes and other services are possible.

In TCC's case, meeting overall and Norfolk enrollment projections including the spring and summer sessions caused a $500,000 budget allotment to kick in, promised when the Norfolk campus was opened in January. That would raise this school year's operating budget to $40.3 million, said Terry L. Jones, dean of instruction and student services.

Projections are that TCC will have 10,950 full-time equivalent students for the entire year, or 500 more FTEs than needed for the budget allotment, Jones said. ``So that gives us a big cushion in the spring,'' he said.

``This is pretty dramatic,'' said Larry L. Whitworth, who wasn't rehired as president in July after having philosophical differences with state officials. Much of the difference was over funding.

``Everybody scoffed at the idea that Tidewater could grow this fast,'' he said this week.

He and current TCC officials began explaining their school's growth by noting that, in January, the local two-year school opened a fourth campus in downtown Norfolk, to go with ones in Virginia Beach, Chesapeake and Portsmouth near the Suffolk border. This fall, 1,552 students signed up for classes in Norfolk. ``A big factor,'' said Lisa S. Kleiman, TCC's director of institutional research and planning.

The school also beefed up its marketing. It hired an advertising firm, used newspaper and television spots, and spruced up ``CareerFocus,'' a magazine mailed to area households that tied together the area's hot jobs and relevant college courses, such as respiratory therapy. The magazine alone prompted more than a thousand calls, Whitworth said.

The college also for the first time analyzed calls to its phone-in registration, and followed up on people who called, were shut out of a class and never called back.

School officials discovered that would-be students who were closed out of popular courses because they filled too quickly - standard and required introductory college courses like Biology 101 and Principles of Public Speaking, as well as computer courses - often didn't just shift to another course. They frequently didn't take anything. So the school added more of those courses, and also other popular courses such as developmental or remedial classes in reading, English and math.

TCC also benefited from a strange time in community college enrollment. Usually, when the economy is going well like right now, enrollment drops because not as many people are retraining to find jobs. Today, though, jobs increasingly are requiring new technological skills - read: computer - and so demand has remained relatively high, said Joy Graham, assistant chancellor for public affairs for the Virginia Community College System.

She expects Virginia's community colleges to enroll as many as 230,000 students this fall, or about 72,000 full-time equivalent students.

Paul D. Camp Community College in Franklin, which has a second campus in Suffolk, reported that it expected level enrollment this fall.

TCC's Kleiman expects to enroll as many as 19,000 actual students and 10,000 full-time equivalent students by the end of the semester.

``I can't say it's any one thing,'' Kleiman said. ILLUSTRATION: [Color Photo]

MOTOYA NAKAMURA/The Virginian-Pilot

The Norfolk campus of TCC is attracting a lot of new activity to the

commercial area around lower Granby Street, which had been declining

for a number of years. Students and faculty are bringing a

resurgence, which is good news to nearby businesses.

TCC PRELIMINARY ENROLLMENT

GRAPHIC

The Virginian-Pilot