By Kristina Goetz
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Jen Temem, 18, a freshman from Arizona, waits to check out in the University of Cincinnati bookstore. (Michael E. Keating photo) | ZOOM |

CLIFTON - University of Cincinnati will welcome the largest freshman class in a decade today at the same time it gears up for the institution's first new president in nearly 20 years.

When classes begin, officials expect 4,553 first-time freshmen to be enrolled - a 10.9 percent increase over the 4,104 incoming freshmen a year ago at Greater Cincinnati's largest university. The last time the number topped the 4,500 mark was 1993.

Total enrollment is also expected to increase to 33,997 students, a 3.1 percent increase over last year's enrollment of 32,975. The numbers are impressive, considering that tuition this year is $7,623, up 9.9 percent over last year.

Victoria Rue, an 18-year-old freshman from Western Hills, was more worried about how to navigate UC's campus than tuition this week. She and a friend printed out their schedules and then searched for their classrooms. She wasn't nervous about the first day of school, she said, but wanted to make sure she knew where to go.

"You're bumping into people all over the place," Rue said. "And everybody's asking, 'Where is this? How do you do that?' And, everybody's trying to find their way around the construction."

Officials attribute the enrollment increase to aggressive outreach efforts and two new scholarship programs. In addition, UC's on-site admissions program, which usually runs through August, was extended through mid-September so more students could apply, take placement tests and participate in orientation.

"We really turned on the soft touch this time around, and the results were immediate," said Mitchel Livingston, UC's vice president for student affairs and services.

UC is hardly alone. With the exception of Miami University, all of Greater Cincinnati's major colleges saw increases in both freshman and overall enrollment this fall. (Miami's was a targeted decrease after last year's freshman class exceeded the school's goal.)

"Nationwide, colleges and universities are seeing record enrollments at all levels," said Melanie Corrigan, assistant director of the Center for Policy Analysis at the Washington, D.C.-based American Council on Education.

"What we're seeing is really the convergence of a couple of issues. One is that the baby-boomers' kids are college-age."

In fact, the National Center for Education Statistics projects the number of college students to rise to by as many as 17.7 million by 2012 because of an expected 15 percent increase in the traditional college-age population of 18-to-24-year-olds.

"In connection with this - when the economy is a little weak - people come back to college for additional training," Corrigan said. "You see this secondary surge when employment options are not as strong."

Campus squeeze

Enrollment increases have forced universities across the country to find creative ways to relieve pressure on everything from parking to classroom space. Some schools are offering more online classes and cheaper credit hours if students choose off-peak course times.

At UC, officials say the enrollment increase and continuing development around campus are expected to tangle traffic and overload parking.

To help, shuttles will take students from the Eden Avenue parking garage on the Medical Center's campus to the Clifton Avenue campus. A meeting room in French Hall was converted to three classrooms. And some departmental moves have been put off for as long as a year to make sure they don't steal classroom space.

Freshmen aren't fretting about crowded classrooms just yet. Instead, they are attending welcome-week events, buying books and learning to navigate a campus midway through the six-year, $185 million Main Street project - a plan designed to improve and consolidate student services in one area that stretches like an avenue across the middle of campus.

To complicate matters this year, construction began on the $109 million Lindner Varsity Village project - a renovation of the university's athletic fields and sports facilities, scheduled to be completed in December 2005.

New grant programs

Students like Robin Cochran of Price Hill are relieved to not be focused on tuition. The 19-year-old was one of 33 students from Western Hills High School to receive one of the two new financial aid options from UC called the Cincinnati Pride grant.

The grants were awarded to 184 June graduates of Cincinnati Public Schools to help close the gap in what federal Pell grants cover and what their families are able to contribute.

The $9,253 package Cochran received is why she chose to study pre-med at UC.

"I was so happy I cried," she said. "I get to go to school for free and get books on top of that plus health insurance. I don't have to constantly be thinking about, 'How am I going to do this? How am I going to do this?' I don't have to worry about money. I can worry about grades."

The other new program includes four categories of awards under new dean's scholarships, which were also opened to qualifying first-year students in 71 study areas. The new scholarships were awarded to 191 graduating high school seniors who chose UC.

"We're right about where we want to be with enrollment," said outgoing UC President Joseph A. Steger, who will retire after 19 years effective Sept. 30. "It's nice to see that growth because we need it for income. But it also says that the changes we've made have paid off.''

On Oct. 1, Nancy Zimpher, chancellor of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, will take the helm, the first woman president in the school's 184-year history.

"We're off and running again, and that's a nice way for a new president to come into the university," Livingston said.

"She has great new facilities, a record freshman class. Not a bad way to start."

E-mail kgoetz@enquirer.com