The CS department met yesterday and agreed that our enrollments for fall are refreshingly crisis-free. It’s also time for a six-year retrospective on fall pre-registration. Time flies when you’re having fun!

Without further ado, here are the numbers:

Commentary

We are somewhat concerned about low enrollments in CS 167—but not as concerned as we might be, since this just means more space for first-year students to register over the summer. CS majors: if you have friends who’ve been waiting to take CS 167, now is the time!

I’m excited to see Whitman’s first regular offering of CS/Math 215, Introduction to Data Science, taught this fall by statistician Marina Ptukhina. I wonder if this is a class that will be open to first-year students with suitable math and CS background. We should discuss that over the summer as well.

CS 270 is enrolled roughly at par for the last five years. And for the first time ever, CS/Math 220 is under-enrolled rather than over-enrolled. I can breathe a sigh of relief for my three-course semester. Our 300-level core courses, CS 310 and CS 320, are also enrolled at or just a bit below par.

We are excited to offer two 300-level electives, Intelligent User Interfaces (Bares) and Databases with Web Interfaces (Davis). Both filled. I’m disappointed there aren’t more women enrolled, but relieved that neither class includes just one woman. I find myself wondering if men are more likely to have enrolled in both courses.

Finally, something new is that we have an “off-cycle” Capstone Project team, who started their project this spring and will conclude it in the fall. This is entirely because of the pandemic—accommodating seniors who took a fall leave of absence and rising juniors who want to study abroad in their 8th semester—but it’s likely something that may continue to help accommodate December graduates as the program grows . Adding up CS 495 and 496, we have 19 students, fewer than in 2020 but the same as in 2019. But, there should be one more enrolled; I’m checking in with him now.

Analysis

Here’s the fall pre-registration data for the last six years, from 2016 until 2021:

Don’t blame me for vulgarly labeling the total as “butts-in-seats.” That’s what everyone seems to call it, and I can’t think of a more descriptive name.

Here is that data again, this time graphically, as a stacked area chart:

Isn’t that beautiful? Thanks, Google Sheets. Some observations:

CS 167 enrollments at pre-registration have declined over time, likely due to clearing pent-up demand. In particular, fewer continuing students means more space for first-year students, a self-reinforcing feedback loop. We are likely seeing a similar trend in CS/Math 220, as more and more students take the class at their earliest opportunity.

The drop in total butts-in-seats for 2021 is best explained by the effects of the pandemic on total enrollments at the college. I suspect that the pandemic is particularly affecting CS/Math 220 this fall.

The class of 2021 marks the current high-water mark for the senior capstone. Perhaps it’s no accident that we see a peak in total demand in 2018, when the class of 2021 were rising sophomores and we still had lots of pent-up demand among juniors and seniors.

Enrollments in CS 270, 310, and 320 have remained remarkably stable. This is perhaps not so surprising considering these are core courses for majors and minors, the number of whom seem to be temporarily stabilizing.

But with all the uncertainty due to the pandemic, Fall 2020 was a low-water mark in demand for electives. I am delighted to see that we are able to meet demand for electives in Fall 2021. At the same time, I hope that our one upper-level elective in Spring 2022 will be enough.