Officials at the University of Missouri’s four campuses are beefing up their recruitment efforts across the country to make up for an expected decline in Missouri high school graduates.

Chancellors for the four campuses told university system curators Friday they initially plan to focus on Tennessee, Illinois and Texas, where the supply of high school graduates is expected to outstrip the space in those states’ public institutions.

In Missouri, the number of graduates is expected to fall 4 percent to 10 percent over the next five years.

"We want to build our enrollment because the university is a tuition-dependent institution," said Chancellor Guy Bailey of the University of Missouri-Kansas City. "Without tuition dollars, you are not going to operate. You can either raise tuition or raise student credit-hour production. We don’t want to raise tuition."

Administrators on each campus are also offering summer programs designed to give high school graduates a glimpse of college life and working with school districts to bulk up student knowledge of math, science and English.

Another bid to increase enrollment numbers is finding ways to keep college students from dropping out or leaving for another school, said Brady Deaton, chancellor of the Columbia campus.

Current graduation rates range from 37 percent at UMKC to 85 percent at the University of Missouri-Rolla.

Deaton said his campus makes it easier for students who leave with almost enough credits to graduate to return later for their degrees.

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