With 1,000 fewer freshmen expected to be admitted into four-year schools next year, the campus of University of Loui-siana shouldn't be impacted by the loss, said Dan Rosenfield, dean of enrollment management.

"I would say it's going to have a minimal effect for us," Rosenfield said. "We've been up every year for the past four or five years. Our enrollment is higher than we projected it to be. More important than the quantity of students is the quality of students."

In a plan to eliminate nearly $67 million from the higher education budget, the Board of Regents has decided to limit first-time freshmen enrollment to direct those students to community colleges, where instruction costs are cheaper.

Selective admissions enacted this past fall was a plan to do just that - direct students who needed more preparation to two-year colleges.
It was anticipated that four-year schools would see dips in enrollment, but UL's freshmen enrollment bumped up by about 3 percent from last year, while the state overall freshmen enrollment is down nearly 7 percent, according to figures released by the Board of Regents.

Enrollment in two-year colleges is up nearly 19 percent compared with last fall, according to the figures presented by Theresa Hay, Board of Regents assistant commissioner for planning and research. Hay presented the figures to the University of Louisiana System board during its special meeting held Wednesday. "This is the shift we were expecting" with the inception of increased admission standards for new students at four-year universities that began in the fall, Hay said.

After the hurricane, first-time freshmen enrollment at UL increased by 6 percent and overall UL enrollment increased by 3 percent, according to the Regents figures.

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Marsha Sills
msills@theadvertiser.com