SDSU's Overblown Student Application Statistics Should Raise Concerns

Dear Editor,

Regarding, "SDSU plan for expansion brings out critics" (San Diego Union Tribune, July 9), all of San Diego County should be up in arms about the faulty logic used to explain this potentially devastating impact on our local neighborhoods.

According to the Union Tribune, one of the "undisputed" reasons SDSU is calling for the expansion is that there were 49,000 applications for 7,300 available student slots at the campus last year. The reference to 49,000 applications is disingenuous, however, since the true bottom line is not applications, but the yield from applications--that is the number of students who actually end up enrolling at SDSU, rather than going elsewhere.

For instance, according to a fact sheet issued by San Diego State University, applications for fall 2003 totaled 38,665. Of that number, only 20,522 (53%) were accepted, and of those accepted, only 7,128 (18% of the total number of applicants) actually enrolled.

Therefore, the number of student applicants in any given year is not directly relevant to decision-making about "growth needs" and proposed expansion. What is directly relevant is the actual student demand (measured in terms of the "yield" from applications)--a demand far less than what San Diego State University is portraying. Indeed, it may well be worth investigating whether--despite its touted 49,000 applicants--SDSU met its enrollment targets last year, or whether, in fact, it was one of the institutions that led to the CSU system's having to return funds to the legislature because enrollment targets were not met.

Given the impact that SDSU's proposed expansion will have on our local neighborhoods, another important factor to consider is the precipitous decline of local students being served by the university. In fall 1999, 43.9 percent of the entering class came from San Diego or Imperial Counties. By fall 2002, this percentage had declined to 35.8. In a Union Tribune article, "The SDSU of the Future," (March 24, 2004) SDSU Professor Emerita Ann Johns attributes this decline to the university's acknowledged determination to "shed its regional standing and recruit more students from other parts of the state, the nation, and the world" to achieve "world-class status" and to become a "top research institution." Also at fault is the campus' "dual-admit" program, essentially a "gentrification" program allowing SDSU to do an end-run around the CSU mandate that qualified local students be given priority in admissions. Under SDSU's dual-admit program, students who are "merely" CSU-eligible are diverted to already overtaxed community colleges until they are "good enough" to meet SDSU's elite standards. According to Johns, "Though the campus continues to be involved in regional educational efforts such as the City Heights Project and Compact for Success (with the Sweetwater Union High School District), many students applying from high schools in these areas are designated dual admits or rejected outright."

San Diego State University appears to have shifted its mission from being an accessible and affordable alternative for residents who are unable to afford or gain admission to the UCs or to private colleges and universities. This factor, along with full disclosure regarding enrollment trends (versus hype about applications) must be taken into consideration by those determining San Diego State's actual growth needs vis-a-vis its overweening desire for "world-class status."

Sincerely,

Pat Washington, Ph.D. Rolando area