With the fall 2025 semester in full swing, McNeese State University is celebrating a 5% increase in enrollment over last year, following years of declining enrollment.
“Our analysis goes back to 2009, when McNeese enrolled around 9,000 students,” McNeese State University President Wade Rousse said. “By fall 2023, that number had fallen to about 6,000. There were obvious outside pressures — hurricanes, COVID, and other challenges — but the truth is, the decline started long before those events.”
Rousse said the university didn’t previously have a clear plan that put enrollment front and center. However, once a plan was created and committed to 16 months ago, the university began to see real momentum in reversing the trend.
In fact, 2024 was the first year since 2018 that the university saw any sort of increase, as it went from 6,061 students in 2023 to 6,243.
“Enrollment growth means greater financial stability, which is critical for McNeese’s long-term success,” Rousse said. “But it’s also energizing to walk across campus and see so many students, to hear their stories, and to witness their dreams taking shape. It’s a reminder that our mission is to deliver life-changing educational opportunities, and that work is incredibly rewarding.”
I’ve been told by every person on the academic side (including board of regent members), from Blohm to Bailey, we must get undergrad enrollment to 21k to make money.
That does not necessarily mean enrollment is increasing. It means the amount of people staying in dorms are increasing.
There is more local Acadiana area kids staying in dorms because they are getting scholarships that cover fees. In the past, they would have lived at home.
The State of Louisiana continues to lose population. So until that trend can be corrected, it is more likely that enrollment at most state schools will decrease rather than increase in the future. It is past time to reduce the number of schools in this State. But we know that won’t be happening any time soon.
we are getting closer and closer to that, if we keep on getting 3K+ first time freshmen, we should start getting to 4K+ and that will get us to 21K+. We can’t expand too fast when there isn’t enough housing and classroom space. The school is still trying to get enough funding to build the Medical School and that should get us expanded to the 21K we are looking for, but to expand to quickly will hurt the student experience and that won’t help in the long run so the new President has to make sure everything is considered and run smoothly. I looked at tuition and it is over 5 times (over 11K a semester) what it was in 1994, so it isn’t easy to go to school anymore.