Enrollment Growing at Orange Coast College

A week into its fall semester, Orange Coast College is showing a modest enrollment growth, with about 200 students more than at this time last year.

As of Monday morning, 21,783 students were registered for classes, college officials said. A year ago at this time, 21,574 students were enrolled.

“Enrollment has been fairly heavy over the past two weeks,” said Nancy L. Kidder, the college’s administrative dean of Admissions and Records.

“We were down by about 1.2% in enrollment one week before classes began, and we showed a 0.5% increase in students on the first day of classes,” Kidder said.

Once the college’s 15-week courses begin Sept. 9 and mid-semester classes on Oct. 21, the final fall enrollment figure is expected to reach 24,000, Kidder said. “We’re continuing to increase enrollment as the days go by.”

Orange County’s eight community colleges are getting a slight enrollment boost because of a healthier economy, a rescinded fee increase and more returning older students, local educators say.

Community college officials countywide project that they will enroll 132,600 students this fall, about 5,600 more than last year.

Officials said the expected enrollment increase is due in part to the end of the recession in Orange County and the state Legislature’s decision to repeal an unpopular $50-a-unit fee for students who already held bachelor’s degrees.