Packed CSUN Halts Spring Enrollment : Officials Weigh Penalizing Seniors Who Don’t Graduate

Officials of Cal State Northridge clamped the lid on spring enrollment Thursday. They also described a proposal to make getting into classes harder for seniors who stay at the university long after becoming eligible for graduation.

Packed classrooms have forced CSUN officials to limit the number of students by moving up admission deadlines. “We’re trying to bring down the number of students and to prevent classes from being overcrowded,” university spokeswoman Ann Salisbury said in announcing that CSUN is accepting no more undergraduate students for the spring semester.

There is no formal deadline, but officials generally have been closing spring enrollment in the fall.

When fall classes begin Tuesday, CSUN will have 29,400 students, about 600 fewer than the first day of the fall semester last year, said Lorraine Newlon, director of admissions and records. The school’s capacity is about 30,000, she said.

To allow more students a chance to attend CSUN, Newlon said, campus officials are talking about giving longtime seniors last choice of classes during registration. Making registration difficult for seniors who have at least 60 units more than the 124 needed for graduation might encourage them to graduate, she said.

Now those students are given first choice.

“If they are just playing around, it’s not appropriate that they have high registration priority,” she said.

Eligible Students Don’t Graduate

Newlon said several hundred students are eligible but choose not to graduate.

The average CSUN graduate has taken 140 units, she said. “That suggests that some of our students are not making the fastest progress toward graduation.”

The plan would not penalize students who take more than four years to graduate because of full-time work or because they have changed their area of study, Newlon said.

Statewide, students at Cal State campuses are taking longer to graduate than in the past, said Ralph Bigelow, director of analytic studies for the university system. In 1980 about 44% of the senior class graduated in its senior year, in 1986 only 35%.

It is not known whether the explanation lies in students’ working or choosing to take extra classes, he said.

This summer, CSUN officials considered starting to penalize longtime seniors this fall. Instead, they postponed action to create a program to reward seniors who have filed for graduation. Those who have applied to graduate in the spring are being granted priority over other students registering for fall classes under a new computerized registration procedure.