Thoughts on the Enrollment Crisis Townhall: Guest Essay #6

In this series, Turner Business is providing space for a series of Guest Essayists to provide their thoughts on the After Action Report townhall that was held on Friday, October 30, 2026, in the University Hall Auditorium. This townhall focused on the enrollment troubles that CSU has been experiencing over multiple consecutive semesters.

     Attendees of last Friday's CSU townhall meeting on the enrollment situation were presented with the case that most of CSU's current (and recent) problems with enrollment stem from "systems and processes" shortcomings. They were also informed that many of these shortcomings would be remedied by the forthcoming onboarding of Element451, the $1 million (every 5 years) customer relations AI platform that will streamline the process of getting CSU students seated in classrooms (more likely, online) ― a process that begins upon a prospective student's initial interface with the institution's website. In reality, however, there are many other systemic issues that need to be addressed in order for CSU to properly function as a university. The situation presented by the information in the table below is a microcosm of these system issues. The table provides the hours of operations of both the CSU bookstore and the CSU library. These are compared to the hours of operation for both the bookstore and library at Georgia College & State University, which seems to be emerging as a prime competitor to CSU. The CSU bookstore is never open after 4:00pm, and it stays open that late on only four days each week. On Fridays, it closes at 1:00pm. With the CSU bookstore being open only 32 hours per week, managing it is not even a full-time job. At GCSU, on the other hand, the bookstore opens until 5:00pm on each weekday and even opens for five hours on Saturdays. A similar comparison can be made in terms of the two libraries. CSU's student population is much more non-traditional than that at GCSU. Having a bookstore that closes at 1:00pm or, at best, 4:00pm during the week, and that never opens on the weekends, is probably an issue for CSU students. The CSU bookstore's 32-hour week would be much more doable for the traditional college students that attend GCSU, yet they are delivered a bookstore that is open 45 hours each week. These are but two drops in the ocean in terms of how CSU delivers a collegiate experience that falls short of that delivered by its competition.