Do we need to increase enrollment

[joejordan]

QUOTE(SnoSkiDrew @ Jun 17 2010, 04:04 PM) [snapback]582606[/snapback]
When the only real knock against us is our average attendance and small enrollment and small alumni base, do we have any other option?? It's not like we can just clone people or put up cardboard cutouts in the stands. We have to get that alumni base up by increasing enrollment.

It's a hollow knock. The related, serious knock, is TV audience. Miami's problem is that huge state school in South Florida. Oh yeah, there's not one. SoCal has the Hollywood advantage, and weak sisters of the west as state competition. Different worlds.

 

[chris]

QUOTE(SnoSkiDrew @ Jun 17 2010, 09:29 AM) [snapback]582259[/snapback]
Having a former law student as the TX governor seemed to work well for Baylor..



Having a former med student as a TX state representative seemed to also work well for Baylor :dry:

 

[gatorfrog]

QUOTE(satis1103 @ Jun 17 2010, 03:09 PM) [snapback]582617[/snapback]
I would love to see a law school. Is there some sort of statute that caps the number in the state, or did I make that up and it's just a matter of starting one?

And FWIW count me as one Catholic who has no desire in the least to follow ND.


For a private university, should be just starting one, then getting ABA approval. It's been a while since I was investigating law schools, but TCU might need to get a preliminary approval from the Supreme Court of Texas to allow its grads to sit for the Texas Bar Exam until ABA approval came in after a few years.

Couldn't hurt to start pumping more ambitious Froggies into state government and other positions of prominence without filtering them through some other school first.

 

[froginaustin]

QUOTE(Houston Frog @ Jun 17 2010, 02:30 PM) [snapback]582556[/snapback]
According to CGP at the Houston Coaches Dinner last month, so far this year TCU has had over 15,000 applications for roughly 1500 freshman spots

Back in the day (my day) ambitious kids (or ambitious parents) filled out paper applications for a reach school, a solid school that ought to offer admission or 3, and a safety net school.

I hear of kids today applying on line to a dozen schools or more.

I'm proud of 15,000 applications. But as I understand it just about everyone is seeing increases in the raw numbers of applications.

I can't see TCU being a high-enrollment undergraduate school in the next few decades. UT-Arlington and University of North Texas, etc., are doing a better job of that sort of thing than TCU has the resources to do even if it wanted to.

 

[wes]

QUOTE(West Coast Johnny @ Jun 17 2010, 10:21 AM) [snapback]582238[/snapback]
Med School - Yes. Lawyers - No. What are we going to do with more lawyers? Plug the deep water horizon hole with them?



Why build a med school when applications are down, nationally, at all of those schools? Also, getting a state charter for a med school would be hard. North Texas has recently applied to add am MD program to their existing DO offering.

The University of Texas system has applied to add a school in the valley and I think in Austin. Thats foolish in todays environment with the uncertainty of this health care mess and while we may face a shortage of doctors to handle future needs, its because fewer people want to enter that profession. The next step would be to lower standards in order to get more people into schools and that would be nothing but trouble

 

[weklfrog]

QUOTE(SnoSkiDrew @ Jun 17 2010, 01:04 PM) [snapback]582606[/snapback]
When the only real knock against us is our average attendance and small enrollment and small alumni base, do we have any other option?? It's not like we can just clone people or put up cardboard cutouts in the stands. We have to get that alumni base up by increasing enrollment.

as indicated above by several others, increasing enrollment to increase alumni to increase attendance at football games is the worst possible reason to increase enrollment.

 

[StealthFrog]

QUOTE(wes @ Jun 17 2010, 08:35 PM) [snapback]582651[/snapback]
The University of Texas system has applied to add a school in the valley and I think in Austin. Thats foolish in todays environment with the uncertainty of this health care mess and while we may face a shortage of doctors to handle future needs, its because fewer people want to enter that profession. The next step would be to lower standards in order to get more people into schools and that would be nothing but trouble

i think the UT system is contemplating relocating UTMB (Galveston branch) somewhere else due to the hurricane and the devestating effect it had on the city. That may be why you are seeing the applications.

 

[froginaustin]

QUOTE(wes @ Jun 17 2010, 03:35 PM) [snapback]582651[/snapback]
Why build a med school when applications are down, nationally, at all of those schools? Also, getting a state charter for a med school would be hard. North Texas has recently applied to add am MD program to their existing DO offering.

The University of Texas system has applied to add a school in the valley and I think in Austin. Thats foolish in todays environment with the uncertainty of this health care mess and while we may face a shortage of doctors to handle future needs, its because fewer people want to enter that profession. The next step would be to lower standards in order to get more people into schools and that would be nothing but trouble

For what it's worth, one version of the med school that city big shots and chamber-of-commerce types want here in Austin is to be a branch campus of UT - Southwestern (the Dallas school). It's to start off with only the last 2, clinical years of med school, and back fill the first 2 years as the UT system has the resources (or wrings them out of local philanthropy) to do so.

"They" are talking about spending a BILLION dollars to get this sucker going. While I think it would be really neat to have a med school in Austin, because this community would attract more top-shelf medical specialists with one, and UTx would be able to leverage their PhD programs in science and technology with help from a med school, we are talking about a BILLION dollars to get a branch campus operating, if they can manage to pull it off.

TCU may have missed the bus on a med school, because in these modern times med schools are so capital intensive and operating-cost expensive.

 

[wes]

QUOTE(Merch Frog @ Jun 17 2010, 10:06 AM) [snapback]582212[/snapback]
My question is, do we become a research institution? Apparently that's the golden ticket.



Unfortunately, we just can't snap our fingers and declare the university to be a research institution. Our forte' is in the undergraduate area and research institutions have far more extensive graduate programs than we currently offer. Thats where most of the research comes from.

Then you have to consider facilities. We have decent facilities for some of the academic disciplines but probably not sufficient enough for a lot of research.

I wish we were more of a research school but it would require a major shift in the way TCU does things

 

[Froggy Style]

QUOTE(TCUTalor @ Jun 17 2010, 03:13 PM) [snapback]582221[/snapback]
I really do not understand how this is still a question.

TCU has increased both applicants and enrollment numbers each and every year since 2003 when I was a freshman. Our school is expanding at a manageable rate. To go any faster would be irresponsible and likely do more harm than good.


this

 

[Houston Frog]

QUOTE(froginaustin @ Jun 17 2010, 03:33 PM) [snapback]582649[/snapback]
Back in the day (my day) ambitious kids (or ambitious parents) filled out paper applications for a reach school, a solid school that ought to offer admission or 3, and a safety net school.

I hear of kids today applying on line to a dozen schools or more.

I'm proud of 15,000 applications. But as I understand it just about everyone is seeing increases in the raw numbers of applications.

I can't see TCU being a high-enrollment undergraduate school in the next few decades. UT-Arlington and University of North Texas, etc., are doing a better job of that sort of thing than TCU has the resources to do even if it wanted to.


I understand that, but from what I have heard, our application numbers have increased at a much higher rate than the national average.

 

[joejordan]

Research, schmesearch. TCU is designed to be a classic undergraduate college experience, set on a walkable campus, in a metropolitan area.

What do we care how much flatulence cows emit annually or how the original price of coffee in South America rises and falls with drug arrest activity? While our graduate programs are nice, they are not destination programs. I would also wager that undergraduate school loyalty/allegiance is stronger than graduate school alums.

There are plans to grow the student body, but not drastically. Keep in mind, if we went to 12K undergrads, that would be more than 50% increase. We do not have the space for that kind of growth, to maintain the atmosphere and salient qualities TCU prospects and parents look for.

We've done OK being this size.

Remember, TCU still has a better chance of reaching a BCS game than 73% of AQ schools. Not bad.

 

[Houston Frog]

QUOTE(crunch @ Jun 17 2010, 04:21 PM) [snapback]582701[/snapback]
Research, schmesearch. TCU is designed to be a classic undergraduate college experience, set on a walkable campus, in a metropolitan area.

What do we care how much flatulence cows emit annually or how the original price of coffee in South America rises and falls with drug arrest activity? While our graduate programs are nice, they are not destination programs. I would also wager that undergraduate school loyalty/allegiance is stronger than graduate school alums.

There are plans to grow the student body, but not drastically. Keep in mind, if we went to 12K undergrads, that would be more than 50% increase. We do not have the space for that kind of growth, to maintain the atmosphere and salient qualities TCU prospects and parents look for.

We've done OK being this size.

Remember, TCU still has a better chance of reaching a BCS game than 73% of AQ schools. Not bad.

I don't even think that's up for debate

 

[berryfrog95]

QUOTE(YA @ Jun 17 2010, 10:08 AM) [snapback]582215[/snapback]
I have always said TCU's optimal size is 12k.

What really helped baylor is that it has a law school and those graduates go on to be politicians. We had a chance to buy Wesleyan law school several years ago. We balked at the price at the last minute and the deal was off.


what's optimal is your avatar....

But, the perfect size for TCU is 10k i feel.....

 

[janorman]

I'm sorry but this thread is just dumb - TCU is ideal b/c of its smaller size, if that means we are not attractive to the Big East or any other BCS conference they can all go to hell. Academically TCU does not need more undergrads - however increased graduate programs would help shape our academic identity and have the increased enrollment numbers (albeit from grad students who most likely could care less)

A law school is in reality a terrible idea just from a lawyer's perspective but if we were able to purchase a medical school that would be the golden ticket to research dollars and increased academic creditenials. Medical schools are more expensive but more can be done with a medical school to set it apart and increase the reputation of the university than a lawschool can. I hear Baylor has one for sale in Houston....

For the guy who started this all - it really boils down to geography - we are screwed in that department b/c we are in a market dominated by the Big 12. This has everything to do with TCU's location not its enrollment.

 

[YA]

QUOTE(berryfrog95 @ Jun 17 2010, 04:37 PM) [snapback]582722[/snapback]
what's optimal is your avatar....

But, the perfect size for TCU is 10k i feel.....

That # works as well.

We can still buy Wesleyan Law for the right price.

 

[wes]

QUOTE(froginaustin @ Jun 17 2010, 03:43 PM) [snapback]582656[/snapback]
For what it's worth, one version of the med school that city big shots and chamber-of-commerce types want here in Austin is to be a branch campus of UT - Southwestern (the Dallas school). It's to start off with only the last 2, clinical years of med school, and back fill the first 2 years as the UT system has the resources (or wrings them out of local philanthropy) to do so.

"They" are talking about spending a BILLION dollars to get this sucker going. While I think it would be really neat to have a med school in Austin, because this community would attract more top-shelf medical specialists with one, and UTx would be able to leverage their PhD programs in science and technology with help from a med school, we are talking about a BILLION dollars to get a branch campus operating, if they can manage to pull it off.

TCU may have missed the bus on a med school, because in these modern times med schools are so capital intensive and operating-cost expensive.



If we were to do something medically oriented, why not a school for health professions and offer a Physicians Assistant program? Or a school of podiatry? Its been a few years since I checked but there were only 5 of those schools in the country. A&M got a charter for one but I dont think it ever got off the ground

 

[YA]

QUOTE(wes @ Jun 17 2010, 04:53 PM) [snapback]582740[/snapback]
If we were to do something medically oriented, why not a school for health professions and offer a Physicians Assistant program? Or a school of podiatry? Its been a few years since I checked but there were only 5 of those schools in the country. A&M got a charter for one but I dont think it ever got off the ground

A PA program, a dental school, a veterinary school and pharmacy school have all been kicked around as possibilities over the years at TCU as start up programs. TCU was literally days away from Wesleyan law school being TCU law school. Only the foolish administration at Wesleyan tried to extort more money at the late date and TCU said blank you and walked away.

If we ever want to increase of USN&WR rankings, graduate programs are really the only answer.

 

[StealthFrog]

QUOTE(LawFrog05 @ Jun 17 2010, 09:52 PM) [snapback]582737[/snapback]
For the guy who started this all - it really boils down to geography - we are screwed in that department b/c we are in a market dominated by the Big 12. This has everything to do with TCU's location not its enrollment.

Thanks for contributing to the dumb thread. If you think its all about geography then you are mistaken. Do you really think we would be an attractive candidate if we were located in any other major market that has huge state schools? Do you think we would be an attractive candidate if we were located in Peoria, KS? The answer to both is no.

If TCU had more alumni/more fans in the DFW market, don't you think we able have some control of the tv market. Why is Tech more attractive than TCU?

 

[Jefffrog1993]

TCU holds its own in ratings look at recent BCS bowl data to see our Neilsen rankings are higher than most BCS programs. This is a myth everyone keeps repeating. We do well in our market and in Texas.