Date of Award

1965

Degree Name

Educational Leadership

College

College of Education and Professional Development

Type of Degree

Ed.D.

Document Type

Dissertation

Abstract

THE PROBLEM

The purposes of this study were (1) to project the enrollments and resulting student credit hours produced for each institution of higher education in West Virginia between 1963 and 1975 and (2), based on enrollments and other factors, to project the operating budget needs for each institution between 1963 and 1975.

Projections were made for each of the twenty institutions of higher education in West Virginia and for state higher education as a whole. Primary importance of the findings was in the application by each institution in long-range institutional research and planning.

PROCEDURES

Enrollments for each institution were projected (1) based on the number of high school graduates in only those West Virginia counties from which an institution received most of its enrollment, (2) based on the total number of high school graduates in West Virginia, and (3) based on certain institutional admission plans and policies. The general assumption of this study was that historic trends in the enrollment environments would continue.

A college financial model was used in projecting operating budgets for each West Virginia institution of higher education. The application of the model to questionnaire collected data first converted projected enrollments into number of faculty members needed under various conditions in each institution. By projecting salary trends and objectives, total dollar demands from the instructional salaries budget item were determined. The total operating budgets, based on the percentage claim of instructional salaries on the total operating budget, were then projected. Four projections of operating budgets were prepared for each institution to reflect a variety of possible conditions.

The least squares method of trend projection was employed in every instance when procedures required projection of historic data.

CONCLUSIONS

The study revealed that if current trends in enrollments continued from 1963 until 1975, enrollments in West Virginia institutions of higher education would increase approximately 100 per cent with corresponding faculty and space requirements Increasing costs, salary levels, and other conditions revealed by the model resulted in a projected increase of approximately 200 per cent in operating budgets between 1963 and 1975.

The projection of historic trends revealed a larger growth in state “Supported colleges and universities in West Virginia and the largest segment of growth being provided by out-of-state students. A variety of conditions in budgeting was found with the result that increasing enrollments cause operating budget increases proportionately larger in some institutions than in others.

The study also disclosed numerous trends concerning West Virginia high school graduates, average class size, teaching loads, salaries, and budgeting practices.

Note(s)

The University of West Virginia College of Graduate Studies became the WV Graduate College in 1992 and was subsequently merged with Marshall University in 1997.

Subject(s)

Universities and colleges – West Virginia – Planning.

Universities and colleges – West Virginia.

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