Fall revenues less than budgeted

Revenue from tuition and fees for fall is expected to be about $2 million to $3 million less than budgeted based on preliminary enrollment numbers, Diane Snyder, vice chancellor for finance and administration, told the Audit, Budget and Finance Committee Tuesday.

She said $40.1 million in revenue from tuition and fees was received through Oct. 11, compared to the $47.6 million in revenue that was budgeted for this semester.

Snyder said the district budgeted an enrollment growth of 5 percent to bring the total enrollment count to 66,798 for this fall. The total enrollment count for fall 2011 was 63,682. Since Oct. 11, the district is 6 percent below budget with a total enrollment count of 59,830, she said.

Official Flex 2 revenue was not counted in the report, Snyder said.

She said revenue from tuition and fees for fall since Oct. 11, without the Flex 2 term, are 84 percent of the semester’s revenue.

“When I turn that into dollars, it’s looking at about $2 (million) to $3 million less than we planned in our budget,” Snyder said.

Snyder also said it’s not far enough in the semester to know about revenue received from continuing education and other tuition.

Dr. Eric Reno, president of Northeast Lakeview College, said this is the first year that the second summer term is not counted in the fall numbers.

“So we’re going to have to back out the Summer 2 from last year to get an apples to apples,” he said.

Reno also said that because registration was cut off early, more students enrolled in Start Two or Flex 2 courses.

“So we probably won’t have anything apples to apples until toward the end of the semester,” he said.

Snyder said she is expecting that students who registered late will add more growth to Flex 2.

Chancellor Bruce Leslie said he thinks it’s premature for the board to take “immediate action to trim a few dollars out of our operations right now.”

He said the district could have a larger spring enrollment than anticipated; however, all community college enrollment numbers in the state have dropped about 2.5 percent.

District 5 trustee Roberto Záratesaid if this is a trend, it seems like the economy is getting better.

“When the economy gets better, our enrollment drops. When it gets bad, it increases. So that may be the start of a trend, you never know. I hope to god it is,” he said.

District 2 trustee Denver McClendon asked if expenses also would be reduced.

Snyder said the district is in watch mode.

“Typically if we were going to adjust the budget, to pull back budget, we would look at that for December’s board meeting. If there was anything in magnitude, we typically look for a 5 percent miss because again we may be higher in the spring,” she said.

In related business, Adelina Silva, vice chancellor for student success, provided enrollment numbers for this semester’s Start Two during her registration report to the Academic Accountability and Student Success Committee.

She said the Start Two or “second start” enrollment count is not included in the first count of total enrollment because at census date, the second start report is not available.

The total districtwide second start enrollment count for this semester was 484 students, compared to the total districtwide enrollment second start count for fall 2011 of 292 students.

Silva said all of the colleges increased their offerings for Start Two because of the “start smart” program, where students were not allowed to register for classes after the classes had met.

She said the number of ApplyTexas applications received as of Oct. 11 dropped 3 percent, which is about 2,000 students, compared to fall 2011.

As of Oct. 11, a total of 68,527 applications have been submitted. For fall 2011, 70,626 applications were submitted.

“I think that by the end of the semester, we probably will surpass the full fall 2011,” Silva said.

She said another impact point that could be related to the drop in enrollment is the number of bacterial meningitis records processed.

Starting spring 2012, new students, students who had a break in enrollment lasting at least one semester, and transfer students were required to obtain the vaccination.

Silva said in spring 2012, 8,600 bacterial meningitis records were projected and 8,548 were processed. This semester, 15,000 records were projected and 16,722 records were processed.

The total number of course sections offered has declined every semester since fall 2010 as enrollments are increased in sections, Silva said.

This semester, 8,221 course sections were offered compared to fall 2010 when 9,956 course sections were offered.

“That’s another one of our efficiency efforts,” she said.