Indiana University Kokomo

The Kokomo campus has benefited from the groundswell of new enrollments but continues its quest to attract more students

During the 1990s, the number of Indiana’s high school graduates immediately entering college changed dramatically: In 1986, nearly 38 percent were college bound; by 1998, the figure jumped to nearly 61 percent.

What does that mean for IU’s regional campuses? If the trend continues, says IU Kokomo’s chancellor, there will be “dramatic effects.”

What's new at IU Kokomo?

Six new degree programs in three years and new facilities, including the award-winning Virgil and Elizabeth Hunt Hall, set a brisk pace for scholastic opportunity and campus life. Add to that an emphasis on traditional activities for younger undergrads and flexibility in scheduling for older students with more work and family obligations, as well as an emphasis on enhancing the classroom dynamic that ensues when traditional and non-traditional students are brought together academically, and you’ve arrived on IU’s Kokomo campus.

Slowly but surely over the past decade, the student population of the IU regional campuses has been changing. That change came dramatically home at IU Kokomo in fall 2002 when 54 percent of its students seeking undergraduate degrees were enrolled full time.

“Moreover, the percentage of full-time, traditional-age freshmen rose to nearly 72 percent of the incoming fall 2002 class,” said IU Kokomo Chancellor Ruth Person, writing in the Spring/Summer edition of Messenger, a publication for IU Kokomo alumni.

“As opposed to the past, when the campus population was preponderantly part-time, adult students, we now have a student population in which the majority is traditional-age and full-time students,” Person wrote. The percent of full-time traditional-age students at IU Kokomo increased 10 percent from fall 1993 to fall 2002. (Traditional age is considered 24 years of age and younger.)

All of IU’s regional campuses have experienced similar dramatic shifts to a younger student population and more full-time students, Person said. “If this trend continues, or even remains constant, it will have a dramatic effect on our campuses.”

Jack Tharp, IU Kokomo vice chancellor for student services, said the changes reflect the overall rise during the 1990s in the number of Indiana’s new high school graduates who immediately entered college. In 1986, the average college-bound rate from this population was 37.5 percent. By 1998, it was 60.5 percent, according to Tharp. Comparing the numbers of college-bound students in each state in 1986, the Lumina Foundation ranked Indiana at 40th place nationwide; in a similar comparison in 1998, the foundation rated Indiana as 17th highest overall. [Data from Postsecondary Education Opportunity, August 2000]

The increase can be traced to the state’s emphasis during the ’90s on K–12 curricula and college readiness preparation, Tharp believes. “We saw the adoption of the Academic Honors Diploma, the Core 40 standards, the inception of 21st Century Scholars (state grants to low income students),” he said. “And the colleges in the state spread the message about the benefits of a college degree.”

IU Kokomo has benefited from this groundswell of new enrollments, Tharp said, but the campus has also worked to attract more students. It has received approval for six new degree programs in the last three years, and has built new facilities, such as Virgil and Elizabeth Hunt Hall. Opened in fall 2001, the building houses state-of-the-art laboratories and classrooms for IU Kokomo’s Division of Natural, Information and Mathematical Sciences.

Moreover, IU Kokomo’s total costs for students “have not risen as fast as those at other institutions,” Tharp said. “In sum, numerous variables have influenced our ability to attract more and more students out of high school.”

While students of all ages share many common goals and interests, the traditional-age student has some distinct needs, particularly in the areas of student development and engagement, Person said.

In addition to new student activities and organizations, several new IU Kokomo programs address those needs, including:

• the new bachelor of arts degree in professional communications, which melds traditional communications disciplines, such as English, speech and journalism, with skills needed for technology-driven means of communication, such as World Wide Web pages and video messaging;

•the STudent Academic Recognition (STAR) Scholarship program, which rewards academic achievement in high school; and

•development of new recruitment tools, including sending traditional-age IU Kokomo students into high schools to talk with prospective students.

IU Kokomo continues to support non-traditional and part-time students with flexible class scheduling, particularly through its pioneering of the ACCELerated Evening College. The program condenses standard 15-week classes into eight-week terms, allowing part-time students to earn more credit hours in an academic year. By placing some class materials on IU’s online course management system Oncourse, some ACCEL faculty have been able to further reduce students’ in-class time, without sacrificing instructional quality.

Because IU Kokomo’s non-traditional students work a variety of shifts at local businesses, some are just as likely to take daytime classes, as well as evening and weekend ones, Tharp said. “We can accommodate them with classes from early morning to well into the evening.”

Bringing traditional and non-traditional students together enhances classroom dynamics, he said. “Instructors will tell you that they have a more engaged class if they have adults mixed in with younger students. I tell 18-year-olds that their learning experience here at IU Kokomo will be better, more enriched because of those adults, who share their real-world experiences.

“I think we ought not make too distinct the differences between adults and recent high school grads,” Tharp added. “Their needs sometimes are quite similar, but it is important that we try to offer a balance of program options.”

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