NIU has officially experienced its largest year-to-year enrollment increase in 25 years.

The annual “10th-day count” shows 1,166 more students on campus this year – a 4.9 percent increase from this time last year.

NIU’s enrollment now stands at 24,948.

“While we are very pleased that students have chosen to study with us, I don’t know how much longer we can continue to take more students without additional state resources,” NIU President John Peters said in a phone interview Thursday.

When state government took a $13-million chunk out of NIU’s budget this summer, it affected more than a few plans. But Peters is optimistic of a recovery.

“We firmly believe the state economy will turn around,” he said. “When the revenue picture turns around, the state-appropriated dollars will flow … so we can hire more faculty and provide more support services, everything that goes to make a great education.”

That’s the hope for NIU’s 3,032 new freshmen, whom Peters praised.

“In a preliminary review of the quality of the freshman class of academic preparedness by ACT score and class rank,” he said, “this year’s class is every bit as prepared and probably better than last year’s class. We’ve taken more students, but the quality, in general, has not fallen off.”

The eventual size of the overall increase was unexpected, but a substantial rise was projected.

“While we anticipated a robust enrollment,” Peters said, “we did not expect the single-largest enrollment increase in 25 years. We were prepared, but the numbers were on the high end of our range. It was a surprise.”

When asked how NIU will meet the needs of all these new students, Peters said that’s already been planned.

“We began planning for this last January,” he said. “We put more re-allocated money into core competency courses, the gen-ed courses. So students may not get a course when they want it, but they will be able to fill their program out.”

“Class size was increased in some sections of core competency courses, and some were combined into a larger section. We’re not particularly thrilled about that, but the faculty have worked very, very hard. What the faculty have done to accommodate all these new students is nothing short of heroic.”

He attributed the spike in enrollment to several factors.

“There’s a demographic factor; our region is graduating more high school students,” Peters said. “Number two, I believe NIU has become a very smart choice for many students in this region based upon surveys we’ve done … Then I think the word is out that NIU is an interesting place to go with Barsema Hall and the Convocation Center. The word-of-mouth is very important.”

NIU’s third-year president also mentioned the Sept. 11 attacks as a possible reason for higher enrollment.

“There’s a 9/11 factor here, I think,” he said. “I can’t apportion it, this again is nationwide, but parents and students feel more comfortable in an environment closer to home. If you come to NIU, you’re away from home, but you can get home if you need to.”

In other increases, the amount of new transfer students rose by 113 bringing the their total to 2,444 students.

“If you draw a 50-mile radius from NIU, you will encompass several of the best community colleges in the state,” Peters said. “Ninety percent of transfers are community college kids.”

Also, there are 638 more undergraduate students on campus this year, bringing the total to 18,105. Also, graduate student enrollment rose to 6,513 – that means 501 more grad students than last fall.

“The economy plays a role for graduate students,” Peters said. “When the economy takes a downward turn, nationwide graduate enrollment increases. Those who may find themselves unemployed might decide to go back to school.”