Spring Enrollment at CSUN Rises 6.7%
Two years after being shattered by the Northridge earthquake, Cal State Northridge began its spring semester Monday with modestly higher enrollments and a slowly healing university.
Officials reported a first-day enrollment of 23,773, up 6.7% from a year ago. But the tally was the second-lowest spring opening since 1975 and down 18% from CSUN’s spring opening-day peak of nearly 29,000 in 1989.
“Most people are coping reasonably well,” said Nancy Owens, president of the CSUN Faculty Senate. “We think we have a very good university. But it hurts you in a lot of ways when you know it’s not like it ought to be.”
Campus officials hope to hear soon whether the Federal Emergency Management Agency will grant their request for a lump sum payment of about $138 million to finish earthquake repairs by December 1997. President Blenda Wilson recently said that about $160 million already has been spent.
Even so, the campus opened Monday with many classes still housed in the several hundred temporary classrooms trucked in after the quake. Plans to remove them have fallen behind along with repairs on a half-dozen major, still-closed buildings.
During the semester, CSUN officials will work to refine an overall strategic plan to guide the university’s future and pursue broad revisions to its general education course requirements for students.
“We’re back, and we’re somewhat better,” Owens said.
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