May 19, 2022
Linda Blaser
President Schutt discusses increasing enrollment on Chicago’s WBBM-Radio
President Stephen Schutt discussed the advantages of a small college experience and the rising enrollment at Lake Forest College on Chicago WBBM-Radio during its annual Education Week coverage.
During WBBM’s Noon Business Hour on May 18, Schutt discussed the College’s record-setting enrollment and why he thinks students are choosing Lake Forest College over a large university.
“We’ve just had our most successful admission year in history,” President Schutt said. “We’ve got close to 500 new first-year students who will be joining us this fall, and they’re coming from all across the country and, for that matter, 50 other countries all around the world.”
President Schutt pointed to several reasons he believes prospective students are increasingly attracted to Lake Forest College. “First, the campus itself has been transformed in recent years—we spent more than $150 million,” he explained. “But even more importantly, we’ve got a suite of programs that are really cutting edge, from neuroscience and data science to entrepreneurship.” He also spoke about the College’s joint Health Professions Program with Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science, athletics, and its proximity to Chicago. “All of those things together just make it a very attractive proposition as that admission record demonstrates,” he said.
When WBBM News anchor Rob Hart asked why students thrive in the College’s smaller environment, Schutt said students appreciate the direct contact they have “with really excellent, well-qualified faculty across all the disciplines.” He also noted that the College’s competitive student-faculty ratio of one full-time faculty member for every 12 students makes it possible for faculty to form relationships with students that “really enrich and enliven the educational experience.”
In addition, the small-campus experience also makes it possible for students to develop relationships and friendships with students from around the world, which sets them up to “understand the world better and really prepare them for any number of things they’ll do after they graduate,” Schutt said. “Students also have the opportunity to participate competitively in sports, theater, art, music, and other things very directly that we offer here at the College but is just much harder to do at a much larger place.”
Listen to the full interview here.