The following is from the Faculty Senate Listserv:

"Good Morning Ray:

Thanks for your continued efforts to share these stories with colleague senators.  The Clarion Ledger article below prompts me to share some data with all senators.  Funding approaches such as the one discussed below are usually based on full-time equivalent students (FTES) which in turn are based on student credit hours generated (SCHs).  One FTES often equals 15 SCHs (or 12 SCHs for financial aid purposes).

Our own USM Fact Book seems to reveal the following data for fiscal years 2002-2003 (FY 2003) and 2003-2004 (FY 2004).  In FY 2003, USM generated a total of 405,313.5 SCHs (summer 2002, fall 2002, and spring 2003).  In FY 2004, USM generated a total of 403,615.5 SCHs (summer 2003, fall 2003, and spring 2004.  Thus, SCHs appeared to decline by 1,698 SCHs from FY 2003 totals to FY 2004 totals. 

Based on requests from several interested faculty, I asked for  SCH data from 2003-2004 and 2004-2005 at the last President's Council.   Although I was assured I would receive the data (I presumed in a timely way), I have not received any data directly from Joe Paul or Joan Exline. I did make another request for 2004-2005 SCH data, and Dr. Exline said she would not be able to  make the data available until  the next PC meeting (some six weeks after my initial request).  I was not able to access FY 2005 data from the Fact Book (I am not sure why I couldn't pull the data up), so there are no comparisons to offer from FY 2005.
 
Although we appear to have seen an SCH decline from FY 2003 to FY 2004, one year does not make a trend.  We won't know about two-year trends until  SCH data are available from FY 2005 (summer 2004, fall 2004, and spring 2005).  Once I get FY 2005 SCH data, I will again report the numbers to senators.

Thanks again, Ray, for your efforts to keep us informed.  Myron"