Freshman enrollment at California State University reached an all-time high this fall despite the statewide financial aid application blunders.
The university system said that while enrollment data won’t be finalized until November, preliminary data for 2024 showed a 2% increase in overall enrollment over 2023 and showed greater than 68,500 freshmen enrolled on the university's 23 campus locations.
“This promising upward momentum demonstrates Californians' confidence within the extraordinary power of a CSU degree to rework lives, particularly for America's recent majority of first-generation students, students of color, low-income students and adults who look for brand spanking new opportunities. “, said CSU Chancellor Mildred García.
The university called the increased enrollment numbers a “testament to the tremendous efforts” made by staff across schools to make sure students and families had more time to receive and consider financial aid packages after aid offers declined attributable to challenges in rolling out the brand new ones Aid packages had delayed federal financial aid forms last 12 months.
It was the primary time in 40 years that the Education Department released a revision to the federal aid application. The goal was to make it easier for college kids to use for and qualify for financial aid. However, the rollout quickly became a nightmare for 1000’s of scholars as problems and glitches with the forms left students unable to submit their applications and compelled colleges to delay issuing offers.
Cal State University, the University of California and several other other schools prolonged the choice deadline for college kids to point which school they need to attend.
In a standard 12 months, colleges would typically settle on aid offers by March and students would settle on a college by May. However, the Ministry of Education only began sending student applications to universities in mid-March, leaving many students waiting for his or her offers of aid just weeks before the May deadline.
Preliminary data also showed that greater than half of Cal State University's freshmen and undergraduate students come from low-income families and historically underserved groups. And just about all (96%) of California's freshmen were admitted.
Cal State University said that while total systemwide enrollment in fall 2024 just isn’t expected to exceed pre-pandemic numbers, the brand new data suggests continued growth in the approaching years.
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