Grand Canyon University’s online enrollment tops 86,000 students, reversing declines
Dive Temporary:
- Grand Canyon Training, an academic companies firm, reported this week that its largest shopper, Grand Canyon College, saw online enrollment tick up after experiencing heavy declines all through final yr.
- The college’s on-line enrollment grew to 86,065 college students by the tip of March, up 1.6% from the identical time final yr. Whole enrollment at Grand Canyon College, a personal Christian establishment in Arizona, elevated 2.5% yr over yr to 108,633, partly attributable to sturdy progress in on-campus college students.
- Grand Canyon College’s enrollment progress helped enhance GCE’s backside line, which noticed income enhance to $250.1 million in fiscal 2023’s first quarter, up 2.5% in comparison with the identical interval final yr. Grand Canyon College offers round 60% of its tuition and payment income to GCE in return for companies like advertising and marketing and counseling.
Dive Perception:
Brian Mueller, who serves as each the CEO of GCE and the president of Grand Canyon College, attributed the enrollment enhance to a number of current initiatives. They embrace rolling out new tutorial applications, in addition to working with firms within the healthcare, monetary companies and expertise sectors to coach their workers.
New on-line enrollment progress is anticipated to proceed within the second quarter, Mueller mentioned throughout a name with analysts Tuesday. GCE additionally projected that it will herald as much as $965.1 million in income in fiscal 2023, which might be a big enhance over the $911.3 million in income the yr earlier than.
Mueller echoed feedback he made earlier within the yr defending GCE’s business model. The corporate closely depends on tuition-share agreements, which assure that it’ll earn a portion of its purchasers’ income in return for offering a wide range of instructional companies, together with advertising and marketing and recruitment.
The U.S. Division of Training introduced earlier this yr that it’s reviewing 2011 steering permitting firms like GCE to strike income share agreements with faculties for recruitment and different companies. Lawmakers have more and more raised issues that these offers push firms to aggressively recruit college students to spice up their backside strains.
“Critics level to the revenue-share mannequin as dangerous for universities,” Mueller mentioned on Tuesday’s name. “The previous two years have confirmed them improper, and we count on within the subsequent yr, this may change into much more obvious.”
Mueller argued that GCE takes on many of the monetary danger for its purchasers, particularly throughout inflationary intervals or when demand for greater schooling declines.
“Our experience, applied sciences and processes have allowed our college companions to proceed to profit throughout these difficult instances,” Mueller mentioned.
