Santa Barbara City College faces an enrollment crisis which will lead to a financial crisis. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, SBCC enrollment had sharply declined. In 2014-15, more than 20,000 students were enrolled in SBCC; this past year, merely 14,000 were. This was an enrollment decline of approximately 30 percent.
City College’s decline in enrollment is likely now to turn into a crisis. The typical approximation is that about half of the college’s enrollment is from the local area and about half from elsewhere. This means about 7,000 students who attended Santa Barbara City College this past year were not locals.
Out of area students are disproportionately younger and more likely than local students to attend full-time. Among the data the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office provides are ages of students. Almost 5,000 students at SBCC this past year were 18 or 19 years old. The local area generates close to 2,000 total 18 year olds each year, about half of whom attend SBCC. This means that, over a two-year period, the local area generates almost 2,000 18 and 19 years olds who attend SBCC. Accordingly, this means that about 3,000 of the 5,000 18 and 19 year olds who attended the college this past year were from out of the area.