Issues in Recruitment and Enrollment
The University of Scranton has a long history of having little numbers of minority students in their ranks. Despite the challenges the University faces, after and during the 1990s great strides were made to encourage more minority students to enroll. Despite this the University of Scranton would find five obstacles preventing them from recruiting minorities as stated in their 1994 Multicultural/Enrollment (M/E) Plan.
The University of Scranton (despite having the name Scranton in it) does not have a great relationship with the City of Scranton and its citizens. While there are a few reasons as to why this is one of the main causes of this has to do with the University not having to pay taxes to the city as it meets the requirements for tax exemption for Pennsylvania. Despite this, the University of Scranton pays property taxes to the city for all areas not used for education that the University owns. Due to the high tax rates in the City of Scranton many people blame the University for this issue and claim that the annual cash given to the city is not enough money.
Being a Jesuit school is also a big reason minority students might not want to enroll at the University of Scranton. In the 1994 M/E plan it states that “Over 80% of our present students are Catholic, but national statistics show that only 9% of African Americans are Catholic.” This shows that for the African American community there is a significantly less available pool to recruit from.
Despite the Affirmative Action plans starting from 1976’s goal to increase the diversity of Faculty and Staff, it would still be a problem for the University of Scranton. During the 1994 M/E Plan: “An ethic breakdown of our 249 full-time faculty members indicates the following: 2 Hispanic, 10 Asian, 233 Caucasian. The Remaining 14 members are not U.S. citizens. Out of our 127 junior and senior professional staff members there are 5 minority persons (1 Hispanic, 1 Asian, and 3 African Americans).” Without an influx of professors and staff members, it might be hard for minority students to feel comfortable and included.
The number of students that come to the university locally come usually for other reasons than them just liking the University of Scranton. Many students just come because of how close it is to people's homes, but more cost effective and closer higher education instructions take many potential students away. The reason why local students rarely like the University of Scranton is due to what was said before in this writing where the university is not well liked. Lastly, the low number of students enrolled might prevent other minority students from enrolling and attending, which was mentioned previously.