Posted 08.17.2009

Executive education: Back to school

Sluggish economy prompts renewed interest in higher education as unemployed workers retool their careers and professionals upgrade their skills

By Nora Caley

As unemployment rates go up, so does the number of inquiries to college admissions offices.

Higher education is countercyclical to the rest of the economy. Colleges and universities typically see rising enrollments during recessions. Laid off workers go back to school hoping that by the time they earn a degree, the economy will improve and jobs will be plentiful. Employed people return to the classroom to gain skills that might help them avoid the next round of cuts at their companies. Still others decide that now is the perfect time to revisit their long-lost career dreams.

Representatives from local colleges and universities are noticing these trends. 

“We are seeing people come back not just because they were laid off, but to increase their job skills and make themselves more marketable,” says Maria Puzziferro, dean of academic affairs for CSU-Global Campus, Colorado State University’s online program for adult learners.

CSU launched the program in 2008 with 250 students and now has about 1,000 students enrolled. “Online is maturing,” Puzziferro says. “Ten years ago people thought online was easy. Now it’s starting to mature and evolve. People understand the rigor and the convenience.”

Denise Pearson, associate academic dean of the University of Denver University College, says some older students think earning a degree might give them more job security. “Usually they feel they were downsized because they had less education than other people at their company,” she says. University College, DU’s school of professional and continuing studies, has 877 students enrolled this summer, a 2.6 percent increase over last year.

Paula Wallace, graduate school academic adviser for the University of Colorado Denver, says some students are adults retooling their career, and others are younger students who recently earned their bachelor’s degrees and are postponing their job searches.

“They are looking at the job market as being fairly daunting,” Wallace says. “Rather than jumping in and trying to find a job, they decide a graduate degree in business would be a better fit, so they go that route.”

Still others were laid off but want to stay in their industries. Scott Tongen worked in commercial real estate underwriting and was laid off in April 2008. He signed up for the 11-month MBA program at the UC Denver Business School. He hopes to get a job in commercial credit analysis.

“There aren’t as many positions out there as there were a couple of years ago, but I’m hoping the MBA will help me have that edge over people who might not have continued their education,” he says. He finished the program in July.

Bill Husson, vice president for professional studies and strategic alliances for Regis University, says in the adult program, the College for Professional Studies, new enrollments are up 10 percent compared to last year. Some adults return to school because the degrees they earned years ago might not enable them to compete with today’s job seekers.

“We talk about how the lifetime of a degree would be X amount of years, and last time I looked it was 10 years,” Husson says. “In terms of changing aspects of society and the information you need that you will get from a degree, it will not last you as long now.” The average age of a student in the Regis professional studies program is 33.

Elena Sandoval-Lucero, director of admissions and outreach for Metropolitan State College of Denver, says overall, applications are up 39 percent compared to this time last year. Applications for financial aid are up about 30 percent. Transfer applications, mostly from people who earned a two-year degree from a community college and now want to earn a bachelor’s degree, are up 50 percent.

There’s even increased interest among recent high school graduates, up about 25 percent from last year. “They are now competing for jobs with professionals who got laid off,” she says. For example, she says, retail jobs traditionally attract high school graduates, but now they’re having a hard time getting those jobs.

Mike Moroney, vice president for enrollment and marketing for Colorado Christian University, says most students hope to enhance their current careers, not transition into new lines of work. “They lose a lot of capital if they do that,” he says. “If they can go in and say, ‘Let me broaden within my area of expertise,’ that increases their value, versus if they say, ‘I’m an engineer, and now I want to be a nurse.’”

Anne Heinz, the dean for Continuing Education and Professional Studies and the associate vice chancellor for summer session at the University of Colorado at Boulder, says 7,500 undergraduate and graduate students enrolled for summer school this year, up 2 percent compared to last year. Some students enroll after their real estate or other companies shuttered.

Community colleges are also doing well during the economic downturn. Nancy McCallin, president of the Colorado Community College System, says resident enrollment was up 10.8 percent in spring 2009 compared to spring 2008. For the summer 2009 session, resident enrollment increased 18.5 percent from summer 2008. The 13-college system is seeing these increases not only because people are going back to school to gain new skills, but they’re attending community college because it’s less expensive than four-year programs.

• Page 1
• Page 2

Last updated on Aug 17, 2009 at 09:41 AM

• Email
• Share