Irvine : Enrollment Is Up for Newly Named College

Although some classes are a long way from being filled, officials at Irvine Valley College said that first-day enrollment is up slightly over last year.

The college, which last spring split from Saddleback College in Mission Viejo, began its first academic year Monday as an independent institution. Susan Clark, a college spokeswoman, said attendance is up about 4% over the 5,200 students that enrolled last fall at Saddleback College-North Campus.

The school’s new name, Clark suggested, may have something to do with it.

“We’ve gotten good public response to the new name. I think that might be why enrollment is higher,” she said. “At least, no one is bugging us about our valley.”

Renamed Irvine Valley College last May after a contest for names that led to such entries as “Gumby College” and “El Torito College: Home of the Nachos,” Saddleback Community College District trustees settled on pegging the new campus name to a valley in Irvine. It’s not very noticeable, Clark says, but Irvine indeed rests on an “elongated plane, similar to a valley,” bordered by foothills and the San Diego Creek, which along with Peters Canyon Wash, provides drainage. “We could go along with a quasi-valley, because we do have drainage,” she said.

Despite an overall increase in enrollment, some classes, particularly in the computer science department, are under-enrolled. Clark said the problem may be due to changes in both course numbers and class names that have left students confused.

The two classes, a beginning course in business software and an overview on word-processing software, are intended for owners of IBM personal computers and have been popular in the past.

Registration for the fall semester will continue through Sept. 6.