COLUMBIA, Mo. (AP) The University of Missouri says fall enrollment at its Columbia campus has slid 6.2 percent to its lowest level in six years.
The university announced Thursday its student body totals 33,266, down nearly 2,200 from the fall of 2015.
A spokesman for that campus attributes that campus’ decline to its months of racial unrest, a drop-off in the region’s high school graduates and more intense competition for recruits in St. Louis and Chicago.
University officials had anticipated the enrollment decline but say it’s not as sharp as initially estimated when fall classes began in August.
The number of black students at the Columbia campus fell by 242, to 2,302.
The Daily Star-Journal of Warrensburg reports that enrollment statewide at Missouri’s public universities is down 2 percent.
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