EMSS Team Members:

Happy Friday, EMSS team. We are in the whirlwind phase of the year, when we each go from one thing to another, barely having the time to think or do much more than what we must get done each day. But is also a season of joy, one that reminds us why we do this work, as we see students we first met several years ago, those we have joined on their journey in some way, prepare for the next phase of their life.

Amidst this hectic time, I want to share with you a few important updates from our division and the campus at large:

Enrollment Update

As we all know, May 1 is a big day on college campuses, the national decision day that gives us a snapshot in time of the likely success of our fall enrollment efforts. Our Enrollment Target Progress team released the May 5 Enrollment to Target Update earlier this week, and it is a definite cause for celebration!

We surpassed the application and admit targets for our First Time Undergraduate (FTUG) student type, the largest group in our enrollment funnel, and deposits are up from that group more than 14.7% over last year at the same time, with the deposit target within reach. Total deposits are 19% higher than this time last year, and we are seeing growth among FTUG, Upper-division transfer, and Graduate populations. While we anticipate some leveling of numbers over the summer, and we always “melt” some students who deposit and enroll without showing up on campus in August, the numbers are an exciting indicator. We are well on our way to meeting our fall target of 6,347, provided that we continue driving late deposits, new student enrollments, and re-enrollment of our continuing students.

Special thanks to the teams in Admissions, Financial Aid, Registrar and Strategic Student Communications who are closest to the daily new student enrollment work, and to our academic partners who have joined us in yield efforts, but ALL of you have played an important role in this success, from participating in Preview or another event, to improving systems that allow students to access the services they need, or serving as an ambassador of our campus in the community. All indicators are strong that we will have growth we can brag about this fall, but please, continue to look for every opportunity you can to positively impact the enrollment decisions of new and continuing students you encounter.

State University Grant Update

A change in policy from the Chancellor's Office related to State University Grant (SUG) has caused recent concern related to affordability for our students in Fall 2025. Based on the new guidance, Cal Poly Humboldt had to plan for a reduced amount of SUG funding for Humboldt students in the coming year - 85% of our current year allocation. In addition, the need threshold changed significantly for both graduate and undergraduate students. Some students (graduate and undergraduate, continuing and new) now no longer qualify for SUG. For continuing students, this includes many who previously received SUG as part of their financial aid packages.

Because of the Green & Gold Guarantee that we rolled out in January, there is no immediate impact to the majority of new undergraduate students, including transfers. Our campus will be absorbing the unexpected shift in funding for those new students for the 25-26 academic year. Cal Poly Humboldt leadership advocated successfully for increased flexibility in awarding for our campus, in order to protect our enrollment and retention efforts. While the recently released draft policy offered us flexibility in packaging aid for continuing students, it did not increase the amount of funding available to us. The anticipated allocation would not allow us to meet all continuing student needs at their previously awarded levels.

The impact to continuing graduate students has been mitigated by a re-awarding process, leveraging the new flexibility that allowed us to match the awards previously given to them. New graduate students must meet the updated policy requirements, but campus leadership also approved additional graduate fee waivers as a supportive measure.

Recognizing the importance of this aid to our continuing undergraduates' ability to achieve their enrollment goals, our University leadership authorized Financial Aid to immediately repackage aid for the 190 continuing undergraduate students who intended to return but saw SUG stripped from their packages in their first awarding. That re-packaging should be complete soon, and those students will have a clearer path to their education. Our leadership continues to advocate for an increase in SUG funding to our campus to offset the cost of this support. If that is not received, we will leverage one-time campus funds to meet this important financial need, which has direct student impact as well as a significant relationship to the ability to attain our fall enrollment goals.

Events

Cal Poly Humboldt Presents event TOMORROW: A special collaboration Saturday between Jason Marsalis and the Cal Poly Humboldt Jazz Orchestra that will provide an exciting evening of big band jazz at Fulkerson Recital Hall at 8 p.m. Get your tickets at https://tickets.humboldt.edu.

Cal Poly Humboldt Presents Doktor Kaboom: Under Pressure!: This all ages event is in the JVD on Wed., May 14 at 6:30 p.m. This interactive family show blends science, comedy and messages of personal empowerment. It aims to validate student's feelings, spark important conversations, and assure young people they are not alone. Get your tickets at https://tickets.humboldt.edu.

Cultural Celebrations: It’s almost Commencement, and that means it is time for our cultural graduation celebrations! Many of our teammates and colleagues are hard at work planning these special events for our graduating students – celebrations include Thursday’s (May 15) Q Graduation Celebration (2:30 p.m.) and All Native Graduation Celebration (6 p.m.) and Friday’s (May 16) Black Graduation Celebration (noon), ADPI+MENA Graduation Celebration (4 p.m.) and El Centro Graduation Celebration (5 p.m.). All are at Blue Lake’s Sapphire Palace Event Center, except El Centro, which is being held at the Van Duzer Theatre. More details are available online.

Commencement: Spring Commencement is on campus next Saturday, May 17 in the Redwood Bowl, with ceremonies beginning at 9 a.m. (College of Arts, Humanities & Social Sciences), noon (College of Natural Resources & Sciences), and 3 p.m. (College of Professional Studies). A special regional ceremony is being held in Beverly Hills on Tuesday, May 20, for our graduates from Southern California whose families often aren’t able to travel to Humboldt to celebrate with them. Help spread the joy this commencement season and be sure to congratulate a graduating student you know!

EMSS EOY Celebration: Our division’s End of Year Celebration will be beachy! Come and celebrate our accomplishments and the ever-increasing proximity to summer weather! When: Friday, May 30, 3-5 p.m. Where: The Great Hall. Come enjoy each other along with some crafts, bites and drinks. Be sure to RSVP on the Google Form, as well as nominate a colleague for an award!

Accolades

Congratulations to Chelsea Mooney, Carlos Holguin, and Megan Krapf from the Strategic Student Communications team, who successfully launched the first piece in a larger communication campaign to families of our prospective students, after more than a year of planning. Special shout-outs also go to MarCom’s Kristen Gould and Forever Humboldt’s Stephanie Lane for their collaboration on the project, as well as to Admission’s Muranda Kozlowicz for her hard work to get all the family contact information active and usable in the system. We know ongoing relationship-building with families can be a significant part of the college choice process for students, particularly first-generation students. While we launched this later this cycle than we initially planned, it is a hallmark in the evolution of our strategic communication work and enables us to begin strategic communication with families much earlier next cycle.

I know this time of year can be overwhelming and exhausting, but I am choosing to instead grab firmly to the joy of the commencement season, and the sense of celebration that abounds on our campus at this time. I hope the same for each of you.

Take care of yourselves and each other,