Atlantic universities see small drop in overall enrolment

Early enrolment numbers are out for Atlantic universities andthe news isn't as bad as manypredicted.

Schools have been struggling to recruit students as their populations have declined over the last several years, but according to the Association of Atlantic Universities 2014-2015 preliminary survey of enrolments, so far this year, numbers are almost on par from last year.

In Nova Scotia, Saint Marys University (SMU) and the University of Kings College recorded the largest dips in enrolment. At SMU,283 fewer students are enrolled, which means a dip of 4.3 per cent. At Kings, there were 86 fewer students enrolled which works out to an enrolment drop of over seven per cent.

This week, the school emailed alumni and said that translates into a $1.1 million deficit for the university.

In New Brunswick, Saint Thomas University saw the greatest percentage loss at 6.5 per cent,a decrease of 144 students.

At the University of Prince Edward Island, enrolment was up less than one per cent, resulting in an increase of 28 students.

At Memorial University in Newfoundland, enrolment increased by a total of five students.

At Saint Marys University,30 per cent of students are international.The vice president of external affairs for the university, Margaret Murphy, says this is the new way of thinking for universities.

In recent years, we've seen the decline in the youth population here in the Maritimes, so knowing that, years ago, we decided to look heavily into recruiting internationally, she said.

To support that, recruitment videos have even been produced in Mandarin. The school is also producing material in Arabic and the dean of science just returned from a recruiting trip to India.

It's the new reality as long as the population trends in the Maritimes and indeed in Canada, we're actually seeing this trend across the country, Murphy said.

Enrolment changes at universities in Atlantic Canada:

• New Brunswick is down 4.8%
• Nova Scotia is down0.1%
• Prince Edward Island is up 0.7%
• Newfoundland and Labrador shows nochange

At King's, the school is also looking to China and Africa to get more students in the door.

Zaa Nkweta is the school's graduate recruitment coordinator and says the schoolasks many questions when recruiting.

First stepis just looking at the language. Looking at the culture, do they read andare they politically engaged? Are they politically aware? If they are, they may be the right student for Kings, he said.

King's is also asking current students to promote the school to their friends who are still in high school. Earlier this week, they turned to alumni asking for help.

I see it like a dialogue, Nkweta said. The alumni is basically our product, they're the best example of what we can be and of what we are. So it makes sense to use that, to leverage that, to get students to come here.

Many universities say if the trend of falling enrolments continue, they will expand efforts to recruit more international students.