(UPDATED, 2:51 p.m. Friday, with revised enrollment figures from Idaho State University.)

So much for the doom-and-gloom scenarios.

Enrollment is rising and robust on Idaho’s four-year campuses. Students are showing up this fall — betting on themselves and betting on the dividends from a college education.

It’s an Idaho higher ed success story, except for one gloomy reality.

Idaho’s colleges and universities have welcomed in more students, but they have fewer state dollars to pay for the support those students’ needs. This real-time fiscal squeeze could get worse before it gets better. Higher education has already taken a permanent, 3% budget cut  — and the state budget still isn’t balanced.

On the enrollment side of this equation, the schools are doing all the right things.

• The University of Idaho’s fall enrollment is 12,383, a 0.8% increase. The U of I attracted its second-largest freshman class in its 133-year history, eclipsed only by last year’s record enrollment. In-state, undergraduate enrollment is up by 5%. Student retention is up by 1.7%, a sign that students aren’t just coming to Moscow, but they’re staying. When President C. Scott Green says the U of I is “bucking national trends” in enrollment, it’s not an idle claim.
• Boise State University’s overall fall enrollment reached 28,519, a 4.7% increase. And it’s an across-the-board enrollment surge, including undergraduate and graduate students; in-state and out-of-state students; male and female students; and students from all demographic subsets.
• At Idaho State University, fall enrollment has reached 13,933, and undergraduate enrollment has reached a 10-year high.
• Lewis-Clark State College hit an enrollment milestone. A 4.3% increase, and the fourth consecutive year of growth, brought enrollment to 4,047 — and past the 4,000 mark, for the first time in school history. “We are proud to be seeing strategic growth at a time when many small colleges like ours, especially in rural regions like ours, are facing sharp enrollment declines,” President Cynthia Pemberton said last week.

Idaho’s enrollment increases come at a challenging time for colleges across the country. Higher education is inching ever closer to a long-dreaded “demographic cliff” — as the declining birth rate from the Great Recession translates into a smaller pool of college-aged young adults. For Idaho’s schools to compete, and successfully, in a tight recruiting climate is no small victory.

Certainly, increased enrollment translates into increased tuition and student fee revenues. Still, the enrollment surge intensifies the budget crunch facing Idaho higher ed.

The 3% budget cut, made permanent by Gov. Brad Little in September, comes to $13.3 million for Idaho’s two- and four-year schools. In their revised budget requests, reflecting and incorporating the permanent cuts, university officials put their dilemma in writing.

Boise State already relies on “dedicated” state funds — namely, tuition and fees — for a majority of its budget. A permanent $4 million reduction in taxpayer support will force Boise State to raise tuition and fees.

“The 3% reduction during a time of increased enrollment will impact Boise State’s ability to deliver services to students and support them to persist toward on-time graduation,” the university said in its new budget request. “Boise State is substantially reliant on student-paid tuition to fund our operations and this budget reduction will exacerbate that situation.”

The U of I says it will have to cut 28 staff and faculty positions in order to absorb a $3.4 million budget cut. Idaho State was less specific about its $3.1 million cost-cutting plan, but after slicing $15 million in order to erase a budget deficit, Idaho State now says it is right back in the red.

“This ongoing cut creates a significant budget gap for ISU at a time when we are already operating under a lean budget and experiencing significant student enrollment growth,” Idaho State said in its revised budget.

Little is putting a good deal of spin on the real-time cutbacks. Spokeswoman Joan Varsek praised the colleges and universities for focusing on programs “that meet Idaho’s workforce needs, support innovation and provide value to students and taxpayers.”

Said Varsek: “These adjustments are an opportunity for higher education institutions to prioritize programs that lead directly to good-paying jobs and to right-size operations so staffing and spending align with the state’s available revenues.”

What’s unstated — but worth noting — is that Little helped create this “opportunity” by signing $453 million in tax cuts and tax credits this year, a threefold increase over what he proposed at the start of the 2025 session. The Legislature’s tax hawks pushed the issue and Little acceded to them, resulting in this cashflow crunch.

The 3% cut is also looking less and less like a one-and-done proposition. Three months into the budget year, Idaho faces a projected $56.6 million deficit that must be erased by June 30.

The higher ed cost-cutting “opportunities” may be just beginning.

Higher education advocates often talk in terms of the “value proposition:” the worth, in time and in dollars, that young adults attach to a college education.

Increasing numbers of students are buying into the value proposition.

In the coming months, Idahoans will get to see how much value their elected leaders place in higher ed.

Kevin Richert writes a weekly analysis on education policy and education politics. Look for his stories each Thursday.