MSU-Great Falls College of Technology takes nontraditional route to a record enrollment

At 14, Daniel Sheasby is the youngest student in his college Spanish class, but he’s eager to learn.

"I’m going down to Mexico with my church group (the Faith Center Foursquare Church) next summer, and we’re going to build some houses for homeless people," Sheasby said Friday.

By ERIC NEWHOUSE
Great Falls Tribune Projects Editor

"It would be better if some people on the mission knew how to communicate," he added.

Sheasby is studying elementary Spanish at the MSU-Great Falls College of Technology, which is using nontraditional and distance students to hit new records for enrollment.

Full-time enrollment for the fall semester is 897, 87 higher than last fall’s enrollment and 196 higher than the fall of 2000, according to its dean, Mary Moe.

MSU President Geoff Gamble cited the tech college’s track record earlier this year as an example for the rest of the university system.

For Sheasby, a home-schooled ninth-grader, attending the college was a tough transition, even though his 21-year-old sister Amanda is also in the class.

"It wasn’t that easy at the beginning because I didn’t really know what to expect," he said.

"But I’m getting good grades in the class now, and I think I’m doing pretty well," he said.

Now his fellow students treat him as an equal, he said.

"They treat me like just another college student," Sheasby said. "They have fun with me, and I have fun with them."

Reaching out to nontraditional students like Sheasby is important because experts predict a 9.2 decrease in college-bound young adults between now and 2015.

"Great Falls has already started to answer how we will backfill that," Gamble said on campus last spring.

Another advantage is that tuition is significantly lower than the state’s four-year public and private colleges, including the University of Great Falls a block away.

"People want access, affordability, quality and options in higher education," said Moe. "I think they’re finding them here at MSU-Great Falls."

One area of growth has been providing core classes that students can take, then transfer credits later to a different institution of higher learning.

A second has been distance learning.

The College of Technology has 531 students involved in Internet classes, accounting for about 19 percent of the fall FTE enrollment.

The majority of students enrolled in Internet courses live within commuting distance of Great Falls, according to Moe, but more are coming from remote Montana locations.

Enrollment in business-technology and in health science programs remains strong, Moe said.

A 3-credit medical terminology class has been a wonderful way of keeping her mind sharp, said another nontraditional student, 76-year-old Elaine Pentecost.

A 1947 nursing graduate, Pentecost has been retired since 1983, when she worked part-time in a Lewistown nursing home.

"Technology advances so rapidly you can barely keep up with it, even when you’re working," she said Friday.

Pentecost doesn’t plan to return to work, but she doesn’t want to let her brain grow stagnant either.

"The students are very friendly and accepting," she said. "It doesn’t seem to matter to them if you have gray hair or not.

"And they’re stimulating for me to be around," Pentecost added. "I’m enjoying it immensely."

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