Grads surge to junior college

High school graduates are flocking to community colleges for their first years of higher education as local universities are forced to limit the number of freshman admissions in response to state budget woes, college administrators said.

Coastline Community Colleges and Orange Coast College have seen a steady increase in student enrollment over the last three years. Each has more than 22,000 admitted students each fall, while universities such as UCI have been forced to reduce the number of incoming freshmen and instead accept more community college transfers.

“We are receiving several hundred new applications each day,” said OCC spokeswoman Mary Roda.

She said workers in the admissions office have been swamped with applications in recent months as returning students and a new crop of high school graduates look for less expensive alternatives to four-year universities for their general education.

UCI is looking to cut $55 million from its budget to help alleviate California’s $24.3 billion budget deficit, school officials said. The university has reduced its freshman enrollment to 4,056, or a more than 14% decrease from the year before and the lowest total since 2004, according to data from the University of California Office of the President.

The school offered admission to 18,684 for the fall 2009, also the lowest total since 2004.

The University of California system also increased student fees 10% this year to help balance the budget.

Meanwhile, OCC has seen a 22% increase in applications for next fall compared with 2008.

The Coastline Community College system, with a campus in Costa Mesa, has seen a boost too. The system had 22,480 enrolled for 2009, a substantial increase in just two years. In 2007 total enrollment was 19,329, system officials said.