Another record falls

BY LANCE SCHWARTZ • CHIEF COMMUNICATION OFFICER

In March 2020, Bethany Lutheran College was forced to move all classes to online learning, send students back home, and close the campus due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This sudden shift certainly could have been the impetus to sow the seeds of doubt about whether Bethany’s students would be interested in attending college – in person – in the fall of 2020. While the hope was to reopen in August as usual, it was never a guarantee. Something very interesting happened during those five months of quiet on the campus.

President Gene Pfeifer explained, “Certainly our hope, even in May, was to bring the Vikings back to campus in August. After all, that’s why Bethany exists—to mentor these students and help them to grow in the knowledge of their Savior. So, we made the announcement early on that we would open in August. But ultimately, it was up to the students to decide what was right for them. We were thrilled when most decided to return to campus.”

In the midst of the worldwide pandemic, the fall 2020 enrollment at Bethany set a new record. And while it wasn’t the first-year class that led the enrollment growth—there are twenty-two fewer new students on campus than the previous fall—the upper-class students came back to campus in record numbers. A metric of student satisfaction in higher education are the yearly retention numbers. Retention is expressed as the percentage of students who attended the previous year and choose to come back to continue their education. For many years, Bethany retention numbers hovered in the 70-75% range. Retention for the fall 2020 semester is at historic record levels. Bethany’s first-to-second-year retention is 87%, second-to-third retention year is 91%, and third-to-fourth year is 94%. To make these retention percentages tangible, this fall Bethany has an additional sixty-three returning full-time students than the prior year. When historic retention jumps like these occur, it’s natural to want to investigate and understand the reasons for such a dramatic change.

Pfeifer explained, “It seems that there are a few contributing factors to our outstanding retention. First, we’ve noted a high level of satisfaction among the student body with last spring’s online learning experience. We also believe our public announcement already last May to return to in-person instruction in the fall was reassuring to students that they would have some normalcy in their Bethany experience. The implementation of our HyFlex learning model also provided students with the flexibility to choose to attend their classes in-person or online. And probably most importantly, the outstanding mentorship and dedication displayed by our faculty to do to whatever they could to serve our students well throughout this time can’t be mentioned enough.”

Bethany’s fall 2020 full-time enrollment stands at an all-time record of 633 students. This represents a seven percent jump from last year’s fall enrollment of 591 full-time students and moves well past Bethany’s previous record full-time enrollment of 607 experienced in the fall of 2009. In addition to the traditional, on campus programs, Bethany also offers online college courses for high school students. This fall, 133 high school students are taking courses through Bethany’s Dual Credit and Post-Secondary Enrollment Options programs. Both programs allow qualified students to earn high school and college course credit simultaneously. Bethany’s total enrollment, including all full and part-time students and high school online students, also stands at a record of 772.

In recent years, Bethany has focused a considerable amount of time and energy on increasing campus diversity and international recruiting. Over the past five years, there has been significant enrollment growth in the College’s international student population. There are now a record 98 international students representing 26 countries taking courses at Bethany.

It all leads the College to thank the Lord for the blessing to be able to bring Bethany’s special and unique brand of higher education to a growing number of students. Pfeifer said, “Even in the midst of a worldwide pandemic, the Lord continues to abundantly shower His blessings upon Bethany Lutheran College and The Lord’s promise to not let His Word return empty is truly powerful!”