Morgan Enrollment, Retention Continue Upward Trend

– Second consecutive year of increased enrollment at MSU –

Morgan State University has once again reached a milestone with President David Wilson’s announcement that the University has eclipsed last year’s record enrollment numbers. This year, however, higher average SAT scores for incoming students and a jump in the University’s retention numbers accompany the enrollment increase.

“I am thrilled to report this increase in enrollment to the Maryland Higher Education Commission (MHEC),” says Dr. Wilson, now in his second year as President of Morgan. “Never in the history of this great institution has our enrollment been as high as it is currently. But as much as we celebrate our student enrollment growth, we are perhaps even more proud of our success in the area of student retention.”

Student retention, a measure of how well the University has been able to help students to persist from year-to-year, is on track to increase by more than 4.5 percentage points to

72.9 percent this academic year, according to preliminary numbers. He also announced that the profile of the average new student enrolling at Morgan this academic year has improved with average SAT scores now five points above last year’s average. University officials also reported that overall student enrollment grew to 8,018 for the 2011-2012 academic year, bolstered by a better than 10 percent increase in the number of students in the school’s graduate programs.

“We are growing the future at Morgan,” says Dr. Wilson, “and these increases are evidence that the growth is very real. It also helps to strengthen our position as one of the best values in higher education in Maryland and beyond.”

# # # #

Morgan State University, founded in 1867, is a Carnegie classified doctoral research institution offering more than 60 academic programs leading to bachelor’s degrees as well as programs at the master’s and doctoral levels. As Maryland’s public urban university, Morgan serves a multi-ethnic and multi-racial student body and seeks to ensure that the doors of higher education are opened as wide as possible to as many as possible. For more information on Morgan State University, visit www.morgan.edu.