around campus Northwest sees increase in fall 2016 enrollment New mini-terms bring potential increase Northwest was one of only four colleges in the state’s community/junior college system to see an increase in fall 2016 enrollment. According to figures recently released by the college, 7,894 students enrolled for the fall semester at all campus locations, marking a 1.2 percent increase over the previous fall enrollment of 7,799 students. One reason for the increase is the number of dual enrolled students—high school students taking college-level courses—this fall. Dual enrollment has seen a 27.7 percent increase, for a total of 797 students, over last fall’s number of 624. “Our steady increase in dual enrolled students gave us the boost we needed to grow the enrollment by 1.2 percent,” said Northwest President, Dr. Gary Lee Spears. Another area of enrollment which has seen growth over the past few years is
the college’s online classes. This year, the eLearning Division saw a 7.6 percent increase with 1,298 students over last year’s total of 1,206. Of those students, 806 are full-time, 492 are part-time and 21 are dual enrolled. On the Senatobia campus there are 2,482 students in day classes and 48 in the evening school program for a total campus enrollment of 2,530 students. At DeSoto Center in Southaven/Olive Branch, 1,818 are attending day classes and 490 are enrolled in the evening program for a total of 2,308 students. At Lafayette-Yalobusha Technical Center in Oxford, 772 students attend day classes, while 189 are in evening school for a total of 961 students. In the 11-county district that Northwest serves, DeSoto County provided the most students with 3,701 (46.9 percent). Lafayette County furnished the second-highest number of students with
835 (10.6 percent), followed closely by Tate County with 767 students (9.7 percent). Other district counties included Panola, 667 (8.4 percent); Marshall, 483 (6.1 percent); Yalobusha, 228 (2.9 percent); Calhoun, 126 (1.6 percent); Tunica, 86 (1.1 percent); Tallahatchie, 78 (1 percent); Benton, 69 (0.9 percent); and Quitman, 58 (0.7 percent). Students from other Mississippi counties totaled 500 (6.3 percent), while the number of out-of-state students was 296 (3.7 percent). Enrollment figures could potentially increase even further following completion of the college’s second session of eight-week mini-terms, now offered at each campus as well as online. Miniterms allow students to take highdemand classes such as Algebra, American History, English Composition and Public Speaking in half the time of a traditional class. —Julie Bauer
Two Oxford faculty are 2016 Lamplighters Two Northwest instructors, Dr. Carol Cleveland and Renee O’Neill were selected to attend the annual Lamplighters Conference on Oct. 6-7 at Copiah-Lincoln Community College in Wesson. Cleveland and O’Neill were chosen for this honor by the academic leadership of the college. Dr. Cleveland, who teaches biology at the Lafayette-Yalobusha Technical Center (LYTC), has worked at Northwest since 2001. O’Neill, who teaches English at LYTC, began as an adjunct instructor in 2003 and became a full-time instructor in 2010. The Lamplighters Program was begun in 1990 by the Academic Deans Association to honor excellence in teaching. —LaJuan Tallo
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Northwest Now
At the October Board of Trustees meeting, Northwest President, Dr. Gary Lee Spears (far left) and Mike Moore, chairman of the Board of Trustees (far right) honored Oxford campus instructors Dr. Carol Cleveland (center left) and Renee O’Neill (center right) for being chosen to represent the college at the annual Lamplighters Conference held Oct. 6-7 at Copiah-Lincoln Community College in Wesson. Photo by Julie Bauer
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