Ag Campus Closures: 2014 Application Numbers Clarified
By Amanda Brodhagen, Farms.com
In a new blog post, University of Guelph President Alastair Summerlee sets the record straight about fall 2014 application numbers for its Ontario Agricultural College satellite campuses – Ridgetown, Alfred and Kemptville.
Summerlee wrote the message after a statement was made by PC MPP Steve Clark in the Ontario Legislature last evening, suggesting that there were more students who applied to Kemptville for fall 2014 compared to Ridgetown.
The statement was followed by a number of tweets which raised doubt in the agricultural community about the reasons why the University of Guelph recently announced it was closing its Kemptville and Alfred colleges in 2015. Clark clarified his comments in the legislature on Tuesday.
“As I have said, despite all of our efforts over the past several years to introduce new revenue-generating educational programs and attract new students to the associate diploma programs, enrolment at Kemptville and Alfred campuses remains stagnant while operating costs have increased,” Alastiar said in his post.
Here’s a breakdown of the application numbers for the three campuses:
• Ridgetown - 1117
• Kemptville - 272
• Alfred – 50