Lack of foreign students due to pandemic and Anti-Asian sentiment has hurt ISU enrollment. Plus continued erosion of State government funding has hurt total enrollment.
Anti-Asian sentiment? At Iowa State? Are you implying the student body or the admissions process is racist? Sorry I don't get where you are coming from on that.
Anti-Asian sentiment at the federal level the last 4 years. Keeping it out of the cave , but facts are facts. You can’t tell me that state government attitudes toward investing in education hasn’t hurt enrollment numbers.
International student enrollment has garnered a lot of discussion the past few years in higher ed circles. I worked in a department at ISU that would routinely enroll several new freshman international students each year. None the past two years.
The drop is especially pronounced among Chinese students. China has a history of poor support of higher education within their borders and what they do have isn't enough for their population. Countries like the US and Australia stepped in to offer those opportunities and Chinese students flocked to the US.
The past several years China has made a significant investment in their higher education creating more opportunities at home. Also, in the US a hostility developed towards Chinese students especially from the Trump administration. This is not political but facts. Chinese families decided the US wasn't for them any longer and are going elsewhere (Australia is still a very popular destination). All of this I don't understand. We as a country should be wanting International students to come here. They spend a lot of money in our communities supporting local businesses. Isn't that what we all want?
Now, couple that with declining domestic population and we have a problem.
Now sprinkle in continued cuts to appropriations from the State and we can't even serve the students we have much less try to grow. And I will bet you the State will underfund ISU and Iowa again this year. Cuts and furloughs are on the horizon.
Lastly, don't forget the impact other States have had on Iowa schools. South Dakota offers reduced tuition to Iowa residents and they attract many students from NW Iowa. UWI Platteville does the same and they pull a number of students from the Dubuque area. Iowa just sits around unsure what to do. It is maddening. Iowa did discuss years ago adding a fourth Regent's school that would be completely online. This was about the time Phoenix began. The State shelved the idea. Another example of State leadership not being proactive.