This has not been an easy decade for WSU, which has been fighting a decrease in system-wide enrollment to little avail amidst falling national rankings, a mass exodus within WSU leadership and an uphill battle to keep Cougar Football on life support.
Enrollment has been down for five years straight since fall 2017, with the decline in enrollment growing for four consecutive years between 2017 and 2022, according to the latest enrollment briefings.
Between fall 2017 and fall 2018, enrollment grew but by a smaller margin than previous years. In 2017, enrollment had increased by 2.8%, but by fall 2018, enrollment growth decreased by 1.4% to a growth of only 0.4%.
After 2018, enrollment growth ceased entirely and began on its downward trajectory. Between 2019 and 2022, enrollment decreased by another 1.4%.
The enrollment shrinkage continued in the following years. Between 2020 and 2021, enrollment decreased by 4.2%. Between 2021 and 2022, enrollment decreased by 7.7%.
In the following year, the rate of decline slowed but persisted nonetheless. Between 2022 and 2023, enrollment decreased by 3.8%.
During the Board of Regents meeting on Sept. 20, regents heard from Regent Picha who presented the Academic and Student Affairs Committee report. According to the report, while first-year student enrollment was up by 2.5%, overall enrollment between fall 2023 and fall 2024 was down by 3%.
Enrollment is not the only issue plaguing the university. National rankings have also continued to slip.
According to an earlier Daily Evergreen article, WSU fell 38 spots from #140 to #178 among national universities and from #71 to #96 among public universities since 2016.
Since then, WSU’s rankings have continued to fall. According to US News & World Report, WSU’s 2025 ranking among national universities has slipped another 11 spots to #189. WSU’s public university rankings also slipped, going from #96 to #103.
WSU’s declining enrollment and falling rankings continues as those in top leadership positions within the administration are choosing to leave, according to The Daily Evergreen. Notable examples include President Schulz and former Chancellor Elizabeth Chilton.
With all of that in mind, could Cougar Football be the answer to WSU’s problems?
An open letter by @CougSutra to the WSU Board of Regents seems to think so. The letter, published on 247Sports, has asked the Board to restore the WSU Athletic Department’s budget to the 2023-24 budget of $85 million.
The Board had reduced the $85 million budget to its current $74 million budget for the 2024-25 fiscal year. The Board is now considering the budget for the 2025-26 fiscal year.
Washington State started the season on a high note with a 24-19 Apple Cup win over Washington. Washington State also briefly peaked at No. 18 in the AP Top 25 poll before ultimately falling out after consecutive losses to New Mexico, Oregon State and Wyoming.
In the aftermath of Washington State’s loss to Wyoming, ending the season for the Cougars at 8-4, WSU lost Offensive Coordinator Ben Arbuckle and parted ways with Defensive Coordinator Jeff Schmedding on the same day.
Back in November, President Schulz announced the formation of a PR campaign tasked with educating WSU constituencies on the importance of WSU athletics to the entire WSU system, according to President Schulz on 247Sports. With the right leadership and funding for WSU Athletics, Washington State could greatly benefit.
“If we look at what we used to get from the old PAC-12, it was roughly mid-30s [millions per year],” Schulz said. “We’ll know more in the next several months but let’s as a placeholder say it’s $15 million per year from the conference on the new media rights package.”
More than 90% of the annual department budget for WSU Athletics comes from media rights revenue, ticket sales, corporate partnerships and fundraising, according to 247Sports. That means the vast majority of WSU Athletics’ budget is self-sustaining.
“So that’s roughly a $20-25 million dollars gap depending on where the numbers end up,” Schulz said.
The recent implosion of the PAC-12 has left Washington State unusually vulnerable. The question that remains is how much added value to the WSU system as a whole does WSU Athletics add?
Cougar Football is a source of Cougar pride and spirit throughout Washington. With campuses throughout the state, one thing that sets WAZZU apart from UW is our state-wide reach.
Cougar Football not only brings revenue into the university, but also instills Cougar pride in potential donors and prospective students. Increasing the reach of Cougar pride may just be the key WAZZU needs to turn enrollment and rankings around.
All eyes should now be on Coach Dickert. Can he help lead Cougar Football, and the university, out of our predicament?
lawrence anderson • Dec 8, 2024 at 5:54 pm
Athletics are important but the real reason for enrollment decline is the debt load it takes to getting a degree. Trim the high salaries of adminstraters and full profs. Pay coaches a liveable salary but not the extreme salaries often paid. Put students first. Recruit and support them. Btw corporate ratings are junk.
Kevin Arthur Penrod • Dec 4, 2024 at 11:58 am
As a 1981 Graduate of Washington State University and a lifelong Cougar fan I must say, realignment and the collapse of the Pac-12 conference has left me uttering a staggeringly loud “meh”. NIL and the greed of huge mega-conferences negotiating gigantic TV payouts has clearly established there are “Have’s” and “Have Not’s”…and WSU is clearly one of the “Have Not’s”. Can The Cougars and Washington State University ever really recover? We always took great pride in being a member of the elite Pacific 12 Conference. But what are we now? Really? Be honest with yourself. We are not anywhere. WSU and Cougar athletics are literally in limbo. And if you think this hurts what you must realize is what limbo really does is create a great deal of indifference. Love and Hate are full of Passion. What we have here now is Indifference. That means a lot of people have given up caring. The passion has been lost. Yes, WSU won The Apple Cup. But was it really the “Apple Cup”? It doesn’t feel very genuine any longer to hate the Huskies…because we really have no relationship with the University of Washington any longer. They don’t even deign to consider WSU a true rival. Oregon is their rival now and both Oregon and the UW live in a Big-10 world together where their Rivalry is real. I wouldn’t be surprised to see the two schools create a new “Oregon-Washington Rivalry Torphy”. Our “rivalry” with the University of Washington isn’t real anymore. Realignment, NIL, and the separation of the Have’s from the Have Not’s has spelled the long, slow disintegration of Cougar Spirit. I love WSU. The 4 years I spent as an undergrad at Washington State University were the happiest years of my life. The education I took from WSU into life has served me well. I have been successful in all ways. But I see the writing on the wall. WSU is not being left behind. It has already been left far, far behind. It already happened! Sadly, I do not believe WSU and Cougar Athletics will ever be the same. How can it? The fleeing former Pac-12 Universities are never coming back to join WSU and Oregon State. It was that group of elite universities that also made US elite. Without that West Coast family of elite universities we are just a couple of nice colleges in nice college towns that are, let’s face it; kinda small-ish and small-time-ish. Quaint. And to use an athletic axiom you might say “…well he was Small. But he was Slow.” Not exactly the recipe for big time success. In the 21st Century I simply believe more and more young people will seek higher education where the Athletics programs are also Big-Time, Big-Money, filled with Big-Stars, drawing BIG crowds to BIG stadiums and creating Big-Feelings. Big-Everything has sadly decided WSU’s future and our fate is not to be “Big”. But to be Not Big. Whatever that means. It is very, very sad. But it is the reality. My Late Father came back from fighting in World War II and though he had no contact with WSU, never attended the school, wasn’t from the State of Washington. My Late Father just took a shine to “The Cougars” and started supporting WSU athletics and donating and sent all four of his children to WSU where all four graduated and went on to successful careers in various fields. My Late Father joined the Cougar Club in 1951 and kept donating to WSU until he died at the age of 97 in 2021. That is Seventy One Years of diehard financial and spiritual support! How can WSU re-create that? I am simply thankful the man lived long enough to personally witness WSU’s Rose Bowl appearances in 1998 and 2003. He sure as hell earned it. I simply don’t believe we will ever create the type of fans like my Late Father Godfrey Earl Penrod 1923-2021. And it is these types of individuals who can lift WSU from the Land of The Lost where the current powers of collegiate demagoguery have deposited us.