WAVE OF STUDENTS; CSUN TO LIMIT APPLICATIONS TO NOVEMBER.

Byline: Sharline Chiang Daily News Staff Writer

Next week - 10 weeks after she started college - CSUN freshman Maylynna Kelly should move off a waiting list and into a campus dorm room. Finally.

When the school year started, she was one of 140 CSUN students without a permanent dorm to call home.

On campus, Kelly's required remedial math class was filled before she could sign up, forcing her to take an independent study course from a workbook.

The English course she wanted was overcrowded, too. So she landed in a class designed for deaf students that the school adjusted to accommodate hearing students this year.

The campus crunch is only growing more severe. California State University, Northridge administrators now say they won't accept students transferring in from community colleges as freshmen and sophomores next fall.

What's more, CSUN is limiting applications for the 1998 school year to the month of November - a sharp cutback from the usual 10-month window that took applications up to a month before classes started.

That means high school seniors no longer can look at CSUN as a fall-back choice if they are rejected by their first-choice school.

CSUN administrators say applicants will be curtailed early because they believe that by the end of November they will get 7,000 applications - three times more than enough to fill the 2,200 slots for new freshmen.

Students like Kelly, her classmates and the class right behind them are on the leading edge of an enrollment boom expected to swamp California colleges and universities in the next decade.

Administrators call it ``Tidal Wave II,'' and say some 1 million prospective college students - children of baby boomers - could be turned away by 2005 if colleges don't expand buildings and staff.

Without planning for the surge, tuitions could soar, loading students with debt and forcing them to take longer to graduate, educators say.

``The state of California is not ready,'' said Mission College President William B. Norlund, who called for increased general funding.

``We're not even doing what we need to do now. If the state can't (help colleges) now, how can they do it later?''

Waiting lists

Although Kelly learned this week that there should be a dorm room for her and two roommates by Halloween, she said she was miffed to be placed on a waiting list and in temporary housing - where 15 more students still linger.

``When I found out I called my mom and cried, I was so upset,'' Kelly said. ``Didn't they know all these people were coming?''

Enrollment at CSUN this fall rose by 2.8 percent and applications for the spring are up by 1,000 compared to last year.

With the student increase, CSUN administrators rushed to add 66 extra class sections, including 13 developmental sections for students behind in math and writing, at a cost of about $250,000.

By 2005, undergraduate enrollment in the state will increase by 488,000 - to 2.2 million, from 1.7 million new students - according to a study by the California Higher Education Policy Center.

That means 29,000 more undergraduates in the University of California system, 74,000 more at California State Universities and 385,000 more in California community colleges.

Growing again

After five years of declining enrollment through 1995 drove schools to trim curricula and lay off instructors, administrators now must reverse course to handle the coming student boom.

So while students were busy finding classes last month, 50 researchers and educators from across California gathered in Los Angeles over coffee and Danish pastries to take on Tidal Wave II.

The California Citizens Commission for Higher Education, based in Los Angeles, has been studying projections for the past year.

The group of business people, parents and educators plans to present a proposal to California lawmakers in March. They would allocate more money to colleges; expand night, weekend and online courses; and encourage colleges to share space.

This fiscal year, 12.5 percent of the state's $53 billion 1997-98 general budget went to public colleges and universities.

For most colleges, ``budgets were way up this year,'' said commission director William Pickens. But that's not enough.

``It can be deceiving. But business as usual will not accommodate Tidal Wave II,'' he said.

Not everyone believes the flood of new students will be a disaster.

``It's a complicated prediction. There's discussion, talk and speculation,'' said Lorraine Newlon, CSUN's director of admissions and records.

``It isn't just about the number of human beings who will be 18 to 24 years old. It's also the question of the number that will be interested, eligible and those who can afford it.''

Recruiting and marketing

Newlon said CSUN's consistent growth over the past two years is also the result of increased student recruiting and marketing.

But if trends continue - rising numbers of babies born to baby boomers, increasing immigration and improving economics - the demand for college education will surely follow, other experts say.

And if enrollment reaches anything close to the education center's estimates, California's colleges and universities would be overwhelmed. They likely would begin responding by limiting access to everything from dorms and labs to professors and specialized programs, experts predict.

Nationwide, public and private colleges should see a 14 percent increase in college-age students by 2007, with a 21 percent increase in full-time students, according to reports released last month by the U.S. Department of Education.

Continued enrollment growth could mean a shift from inconvenienced students to a potential societal disaster, observers say.

``We have a possibility of tragedy of the commons here,'' Roger Benjamin said at a commission panel discussion last month.

Students could be turned away

The privately funded higher education commission predicts that perhaps 1 million students could be turned away from universities by 2010 unless admittance policy changes are made.

According to current state policy, the top 12.5 percent California high school students are eligible for University of California schools and the top third must be allowed into the California State University system.

Tidal Wave II is expected to hit hardest at the state's community college system, which enrolls 60 percent of the state's college students.

Over the next 10 years, 80 percent of all state students are expected to seek admission into the 106 campuses in California's community college system, Pickens said.

``The community colleges need to direct every dollar they can to services to students,'' Pickens said. ``It's important that this diverse group of students has an opportunity to achieve their educational objectives.''

Pressure is really on at the Los Angeles Community College District.

The nation's largest community college system enrolled 102,000 students this fall, including those at Pierce College in Woodland Hills, Mission College in Sylmar and Valley College in Van Nuys.

Yet a new push for LACCD campuses to repay debt left schools with less money than they needed and more students.

District belt-tightening forced eight of nine LACCD campuses to reduce everything from classes and teachers to supplies and library hours over the summer. All while enrollment increased by 3.4 percent.

Even private colleges are feeling the rising tide. At the University of Southern California, a record 21,000 students applied for 2,800 freshman seats this fall. The previous year 16,000 people applied.

At the California Institute of the Arts in Valencia, the number of applications broke school records this year - with 2,203 aspiring artists vying for just 400 spaces at the prestigious four-year institute.

The outlook for students like Kelly who are awash in Tidal Wave II seems to promise more long lines, more waiting and more aggravation - distractions Kelly said she could do without.

``I felt if there weren't so many many people here,'' she said, ``I would've been in my classes and in housing right off the bat.''

Shoring up

The California Citizens Commission on Higher Education and other groups are looking for ways to accommodate ``Tidal Wave II,'' about a half-million more students in the next decade, by breaking traditional concepts of ``The College.'' Ideas include:

Virtual learning: Allows students to earn credit through online courses and attend class via teleconferencing. Relieves crowding and offers time flexibility.

Accelerating: Tailors degree programs so students can graduate in less than four years.

Streamlining: High schools and community colleges teach math and English basics, for credit, so students don't waste time taking these courses upon entering four-year schools.

Sharing: Colleges and universities offer courses on one another's campuses.

Building: Constructing new colleges isn't one of the commission's main priorities, but members support adding new schools in areas without colleges, such as the CSU Channel Islands campus planned on the site of the former Camarillo State Hospital in Ventura County and expected to open by 1999. There are also proposals to open a UC campus in the Central Valley as early as 2005.

CAPTION(S):

2 Photos, box, chart

PHOTO (1 -- color) CSUN freshman Maylynna Kelly tries to study in the temporary dorm room that has been her home this fall while she waits for a permanent assignment.

Terri Thuente/Daily News

(2 -- color) Thousands of students travel the halls of Valley College, and many more are expected to come.

Evan Yee/Daily News

Chart: Tidal wave 2

Box: Shoring up (see text)