USU Enrollments Up Slightly in 2023, Sees Strong Growth in Concurrent Enrollment

Utah State University furthered its land-grant mission of excellence, access and inclusion with 2023 enrollment up among students at Statewide Campuses, concurrent enrollment students and underrepresented students, according to new enrollment data.

USU Executive Vice President Robert Wagner said the university has plans in place to continue increasing access to higher education through scholarships and admissions improvements.

“Looking ahead, USU has unveiled its 4-year scholarship program for fall 2024,” Wagner said. “We also have automated the admissions process, are waiving application fees in the month of October, and have implemented an enrollment confirmation process to help with housing and registration.”

The new statistics come from enrollment data three weeks into the fall 2023 semester, which were released by the Utah System of Higher Education on Tuesday.

The total number of students at Utah’s land-grant university, including high school concurrent enrollment, rose 0.4% from 2022. With just over 28,000 students, fall 2023 saw the highest number of USU enrollments since fall 2016. The full-time equivalent among undergrads and graduate students fell by about half a percent.

Concurrent enrollment continued to see strong growth at USU, with the number of high school students also earning credits at the university rising by more than 400, a 10% increase.

“This increase demonstrates our commitment to access to higher education,” Wagner said, “especially in the more rural areas of the state where opportunities for higher education are critical. USU has the capacity to grow even more with its broadening access to higher education within our local communities, on our residential campuses, and through technology-delivered teaching and learning no matter where students are located.”

USU’s enrollment highlights also included:

• Undergraduate enrollment at USU’s Statewide Campuses increased by 4.3%.
• Overall Latino student enrollments increased by 4.3% from 2022 to 2023, following a 10% increase from 2021 to 2022.
• Overall academic persistence among USU students improved, with 70% of students who were enrolled in spring 2023 continuing to fall 2023. That figure is up from 68% in 2022 and 67% in 2021. Persistence among underrepresented students saw an especially strong increase, up to 67% in 2023 from 64% in 2022.
• USU welcomed more than 600 new and returning graduate students to its campuses this fall, representing an increase of about 100 from fall 2022.

More 2023 enrollment data for USU and other USHE institutions, including headcount and full-time equivalent figures, are available at USHE’s website.