Ivy Tech Wants To Double Degrees Awarded Annually

The Ivy Tech Keith Busse Steel Dynamics Tech Center in Fort Wayne. (Photo courtesy of Ivy Tech Community College)

Ivy Tech Community College’s new strategic plan calls for more than doubling the number of degrees earned by students in the next five years.

Ivy Tech President Sue Ellspermann wants to boost certifications, certificates and degrees awarded statewide from about 21,000 to 50,000 annually by 2023.

She also wants to grow enrollment by more than 25 percent in the next five years from about 94,000 students to nearly 120,000 students.

To help reach that goal, the college is improving academic advising and offering eight-week classes to help recruit and retain students.

“Indiana is home to some of the world’s largest, most innovative corporations — not to mention countless ambitious smaller companies and start-ups,” Ellspermann said in a statement. “And all of them share a common need: well-trained, skilled workers.”

Ivy Tech’s five-year plan comes as the state seeks to increase its overall college attainment rate to 60 percent by 2025.

In past years the college has been under pressure by lawmakers to increase its role in preparing the state’s workforce.

In 2015, the Indiana General Assembly ordered the state Commission For Higher Education to review Ivy Tech programs with low graduation rates and eliminate or restructure programs.

The commission found that after six years only 24 percent of students have graduated and 41 percent are still enrolled. Twenty-five percent of Ivy Tech students who transferred to the four-year college, such as Purdue or Indiana universities, earned a bachelor’s degrees within six years.