Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1956 [PAGE 38]

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1954]

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS

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Table 3 Student Enrollment, IQ53-54, at University of Illinois {Navy Pier), by Groups of Community Areas in Chicago Community Area Groupings Number of Community Range of Median _ IQ53S4 Enrollment Number Percentage Areas in Group Family Income 1949 " " 20 $4,466-56,946 28.3 853 20 $4,216-54,463 737 24-5 20.2 6n 14 $3,843-$4,2io 560 18.5 9 ?3,473-?3,799 8-5 255 11 ?2,i68-$3,442 100.0 3.016 74* * Data for Community Area 32 (the Loop) excluded. The evidence from these two studies would appear to support a statement that, while there is a somewhat greater proportion of students at Navy Pier from lower income families, the economic status of the student body, as a whole, on the two campuses of the University is nearly the same. At any rate, the Committee believes that the difference in economic status as shown by family income is not sufficiently great in itself to warrant its being used as a major reason for the development of a four-year undergraduate division in Chicago. Academic History of Students. In order to discover the academic history of students who register at Navy Pier, the Bureau of Institutional Research had instituted a study before the establishment of this Committee, and the Bureau's data was made available to the Committee. Table 4 presents a summary of the data as of the second semester of 1953-54 for the 1,236 new freshmen who enrolled at Navy Pier in the fall of 1950. Of this total group, 839 students left before completing two years of work, and 464 transferred to another university or to the main University campus either before or after completing their sophomore 3'ea.r at Navy Pier. From the total group, there were only 60 students who completed two years and did not continue in college. Reasons for not continuing in college are not available, but if we assume that all of them failed to do so because of financial circumstances and add thereto the 30 who gave finances as the reason for withdrawing within the first two years, we find only 90 students, or only 7.3 per cent, who were forced to stop their education because of limited finances. Further evidence concerning plans of students after they complete two years at Navy Pier is available in the report from Dean Brown's committee earlier referred to. In this study, the students were asked to indicate answers to the question: "What do you plan to do when you leave the Pier?" Seventy-six per cent of the respondents gave their plans as continuing attendance at college; 46.5 per cent mentioned the Champaign-Urbana campus only. The data presented in the preceding paragraphs give little support to arguments that the strident body at Naz,y Pier comes from a lower socio-economic group than does that at Champaign-Urbana, or that there is a very large number of students prohibited from continuing in college because junior and senior work is not offered. It is true, as shown in data from Dean Brown's committee, that the average cost reported by students for the first semester x 943-54 was only $259, or $518 when extended for a full year. On the Champaign-Urbana campus, a report from the Dean of Men's office earlier referred to indicates that the average cost for students living in cooperative housing in Champaign-Urbana is approximately $875 per year. For students living in fraternities or dormitories, the cost at Champaign-Urbana was from $200 to $300 greater per year. From information available to the Committee, it also appears that many students at Navy Pier work to make part of their expenses, and they earn more on the average than do students at Urbana. These data can be interpreted that students at the Chicago Undergraduate Division are able to attend the University of Illinois at a lower net cost than students from essentially the same socio-economic groups attending the University at Champaign-Urbana. Although the opportunity to attend the University at a low net cost is understandably desired by Navy Pier students and their parents, the Committee does not believe that this is an urgent reason for immediate introduction of junior