Northwest Winemaking Schools in Flux

(Wines&Vines) - Viticulture and enology students are hitting the books for another term, but some colleges report seeing fewer students than in previous years.

While enrollment in V&E programs at four-year universities has remained stable during the past five years, some community colleges in the Northwest report that student numbers have dropped off since the recession.

“Our program is down in enrollment,” says Chris Lake, director of the Southern Oregon Wine Institute at Umpqua Community College in Roseburg. A

n upswing in federal grants for students to return to college during the 2008-09 period boosted the college’s viticulture and enology program to 75 students in 2009-10, but this fall there are just 30 students registered.

“From 2008-10 we saw this big bubble coming in of all these students—first, dumped out of employment because of the tanking economy, then second, the federal government encouraged lots of people to go back to school,” Lake tells Wines & Vines. “Now it’s trended back.”

That trend reflects the broader national picture. Statistics released by the U.S. Census Bureau last week indicate that college enrollment slipped from 20.4 million in October 2011 to 19.9 million in October 2012—a shift of 467,000 students nationwide.