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Sat, Oct 8, 9:30 - 9:55, Governors D Paper (refereed)

Recommended Citation: Lenox, T L, C R Woratschek, and G A Davis. Exploring Declining CS/IS/IT Enrollments. In The Proceedings of the Information Systems Education Conference 2005, v 22 (Columbus OH): §3124. ISSN: 1542-7382. (A later version appears in Information Systems Education Journal 6(44). ISSN: 1545-679X.)

Exploring Declining CS/IS/IT Enrollments

Refereed

11 pages

Terri L. Lenox    [a1] [a2]
Department of Mathematics and Computer Science
Westminster College    [u1] [u2]
New Wilmington, Pennsylvania, USA    [c1] [c2]

Charles R. Woratschek    [a1] [a2]
Computer Information Systems
Robert Morris University    [u1] [u2]
Moon Township, Pennsylvania, USA    [c1] [c2]

Gary A. Davis    [a1] [a2]
Computer Information Systems
Robert Morris University    [u1] [u2]
Moon Township, Pennsylvania, USA    [c1] [c2]

Declining enrollments in Computer Science (CS), Information Systems (IS), and Information Technology (IT) programs reported by the media are a real concern to both academicians and employers. Ninety-one percent of the respondents to a brief survey confirmed that enrollment was down in their undergraduate programs. The top six reasons for declining enrollment reported were: outsourcing of CS/IS/IT jobs (67%), the economy in general (59.8%), the dot.com failure (48.8%), the cyclic nature of business (40%), decline in students’ analytic abilities (29.26%) and failure of the institution to actively recruit students (26.8%). Respondents reported various attempts to increase enrollments including increased enrollment efforts to local high schools (46.35%), changing the types of courses offered (37.8%), increasing articulation agreements (36.6%), creating new major(s) with other discipline(s) (29.2%), creating new tracks within the major (29.2%), and increasing recruitment efforts to community colleges/IT schools (29.2%).

Keywords: computer careers, declining enrollment in computer careers, women‘s enrollment in computer careers

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