Undergraduate Course Enrollment on the Rise

December 8, 2024

The number of total credit hours that students are taking at the Jackson School of Geosciences grew by 19% from the 2022–2023 academic year to the 2023–2024 year. The huge uptick — from 14,233 credit hours to 16,950 credit hours — bucks the downward trend most geoscience schools are experiencing, both nationally and internationally.

The Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences’ introductory courses are a big driver of this growth. Even if students do not go on to major at the Jackson School, undergraduates are increasingly choosing to fulfill their natural sciences requirement here.

Veronica Vasquez, the Jackson School’s assistant dean of academics and student affairs, foresees that with the introduction of the department’s new Climate System Science major this fall, the student credit hour numbers will only continue to increase.