<p>[Peters</a> wants NIU’s enrollment at 30,000 by 2020 | Daily Chronicle](<a href=“http://www.daily-chronicle.com/2011/09/01/peters-wants-nius-enrollment-at-30-000-by-2020/aqvezqk/]Peters”>http://www.daily-chronicle.com/2011/09/01/peters-wants-nius-enrollment-at-30-000-by-2020/aqvezqk/)</p>
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<p>(Yes, barrons, we know, we know…)</p>
<p>Actually NIU is one of the better directional U’s and I know it well. It would easily make the keeper/worthwhile group. A long time ago I spent a few months living in Dekalb with a relative while between UG and grad school. I also helped a good friend go there for two years after graduating from CC in Chicago.</p>
<p>I only know of this school as a regular preseason football opponent for UW… Good luck to them (in academics).</p>
<p>Daughter '13 just got invitation to apply to honors college. Don’t remember any mailings for son '10, so I am seeing how they are approaching this.</p>
<p>A lot of kids from our area go there, and many get very good starts in life from an NIU degree. They’re strong in business, journalism/communications, and education, and no doubt other areas too. But like all the Illinois “directionals,” they also admit a substantial number of freshmen who aren’t ready for college work (the 25th percentile ACT is 19 or 20), so their percentage of freshmen returning as sophomores is low.</p>
<p>My friend got her degree in communications and PR. She is now a VP for the Northern Trust in PR. Accting is also well known. Yes they flunkout a good number but that’s not all bad either.</p>
<p>@annasdad - exactly, NIU should be more worried about their selection criteria. They are letting in an element that would have a hard time getting into other large universities. There are actually a set of dorms referred to as the "ghettos.</p>
<p>And I believe they are seeing the affects on their business school - good candidates are choosing not to go there due to the undesirable element.</p>
<p>We are seeing a lot more Chicago area kids at Iowa and Iowa State partly because NIU is just not seen as a viable option for business and engineering students. They are paying $15000 a year more at our schools and we thank them for their money.</p>
<p>IUPUI in Indiana is working toward the same goal and is already seeing positive effects. They doubled the merit aid, built more dorms, etc. Hopefully they will see positive results. They also seem to be raising their standards on the lower end of the scale, based on the number of kids from our high school that were denied entry. Seems to me that Illinois should increase funding to the community colleges and direct those not ready for school into the community college/direct transfer route.</p>
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<p>President Peters says in his remarks I quoted that they will try to raise their selection criteria. I have really serious doubts about whether they can do that and at the same time significantly increase the enrollment. I’d have those doubts even if they had a lot of money available for merit scholarships - and they don’t, and I can’t see any likely source for them to get it.</p>
<p>NIU’s profile of admitted applicants (at least from the ACT range) is almost exactly the same as the other four Illinois downstate “directionals.” They all have ACT ranges in the 19/20 - 24/25 range and 6-year graduation rates below 50%.</p>
<p>Except for SIU-Edwardsville, they all at one time were teacher’s colleges that morphed into universities. They exist today to give the less-well-prepared Illinois high school graduate a shot at college. I know a lot of “directional” graduates who have gone on to very successful graduate school, business, and professional careers. But the fact remains that over half the eager freshmen who moved in last month won’t ever walk across the stage there. </p>
<p>You can argue, as MizzBee does:</p>
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<p>and I would agree. If I were the czar of Illinois, one of many changes I’d make to our education system would be to make all public colleges except UIUC, UIC, and ISU upper-division-only schools, and I’d make major investments in the community college system to compensate. But I’m not the czar, will most likely never be the czar, and politically, that’s not going to happen.</p>
<p>They better make sure they have the room and the classes to accommodate the extra students. </p>
<p>UIC wants to increase its student population; however, they are planning to do this by increasing number of evening classes.</p>
<p>Here is the latest dashboard from IUPUI. They also have goals of increasing enrollment, but they focused first on increasing quality enrollment. The biggest change that was made, however, was that they increased the auto merit aid to attract higher-stat students that would have otherwise gone to IU or Purdue.
[Dashboard</a> : About IUPUI : IUPUI](<a href=“http://www.iupui.edu/dashboard/]Dashboard”>http://www.iupui.edu/dashboard/)</p>
<p>Perhaps NIU could follow this model.</p>
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<p>Nothing like a generalization if I’ve ever seen one. You do realize that SIU has a Medical School and a Dental School, correct? And I’ve seen plenty of highly-ranked students going to these “directional” schools and doing well there. Not everybody wants to go to a U of I and be one of 40,000 students…</p>
<p>At the undergraduate level, they exist primarily to give students whose stats won’t get them into UIUC a 4-year public college alternative. The ACT 75th percentile for the five directionals is 24. The 25th for UIUC is 26. Very few students who could get into UIUC wind up at a directional.</p>
<p>Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using CC App</p>
<p>S is a freshman at NIU. OOS with lots of merit scholarship money due to ACT of 32 and music ability so he apparently fits their “future”. Very happy there-his core classes have questionable students but his music major classmates are serious types. NIU has new construction happening now and many updates. We will see how it works out!</p>