More students than ever are attending classes at the University of Hawai'i's seven community colleges, with enrollment surging 9 percent over the previous year, UH officials said yesterday.

All campuses registered increases for the fall semester, and four of the seven reported record enrollment.

The sharpest gains are at the Big Island's Hawai'i Community College and O'ahu's Leeward Community College, which both saw 14 percent increases. Joining them with record enrollment are the Kapi'olani and Maui community colleges.

Overall, the community colleges attracted nearly 29,000 students this fall.

The numbers seem to be consistent with record enrollment at two-year community colleges across the Mainland.

John Morton, UH vice president for community colleges, credited the gains to a heightened effort to increase the rolls by adding more classes and stepping up marketing efforts.

A struggling economy may also be a factor. National experts say families squeezed by tough economic times have steered high school graduates away from more expensive four-year universities.

That's not necessarily the case here, however. UH systemwide enrollment figures, including those from flagship UH-Manoa and fast-growing UH-West O'ahu, are expected to be released today and they, too, are likely to be higher.

EFFORT TO GROW

In the past at Hawai'i community colleges, "we always had a problem (where) our tuition didn't even cover the marginal cost of a class, so that if we added classes, we'd lose money even if we filled them up," Morton said.

But the Legislature began providing additional money specifically to add classes to meet the new demand — $1.3 million last school year and $2.4 million this year.

"Once we knew we had that, we started getting the word out to some of our marketing campaigns that 'Hey, we're open for business, come,'" Morton said. "And the people have responded."

The result was a small bump last year, and this year's 9 percent jump.

"We made a very conscious attempt to try to grow because we think Hawai'i needs more people with higher education and so we wanted to make the community colleges more accessible — and particularly in places like the Big Island and West O'ahu, all the data shows they are the least well-served by the University of Hawai'i," Morton said.

A big part of the increase at Hawai'i Community College came from a satellite campus that leases space in Kealakekua, Kona.

UH, anticipating even bigger enrollment in the two highest-growth areas, has plans for new facilities in Kona and at LCC.

UH has received land for a campus near the Kona airport, and a private developer is being required to provide the money for a building with 200,000 square feet of classrooms, Morton said.

Meanwhile, LCC's space-sharing arrangement in Pearl City with UH-West O'ahu is set to end when West O'ahu moves to its new home in Kapolei in 2010. The state has also released design funds for a new building on the LCC campus, Morton said.

NATIONAL TREND

Preliminary reports from community colleges across the nation, which had overall enrollment of 11.5 million last year, showed summer enrollments increased, a trend predicted to extend into the fall, according to Norma Kent, a spokeswoman for the American Association of Community Colleges.

Kent said the trend is in line with other economic downturns. Community colleges traditionally see increased demand for their workforce-training programs from people who have been laid off or are in search of additional skills.

The bulk of federal higher-education funding goes to four-year schools, yet two-year schools enroll almost half the nation's undergraduates, according to the American Association of Community Colleges. Salaries and infrastructure costs are higher at four-year schools, and community college officials say they've long been expected to do more with less.