in marketing it, and the university also failed to reach out for more recruitment. It just wasn’t as active as it should have been.” It didn’t help that the university went through three different presidents in four years, he adds. [Current interim president Cutrer has confirmed she will be stepping down at the end of this academic year, paving the way for yet another new president.] “We have a rich theater and music scene here in Sonoma County, with so many spaces in which to create and many venues seeking actors, producers and so on. I felt it was odd that the university didn’t push more to save the Theater Arts program for that reason. To me it seems like a missed opportunity for Sonoma State, because they could have capitalized on that.” In late spring, Ed Mills, the university’s vice-president of strategic enrollment, told the local media that during most of its existence, the CSU system never really had to recruit because it had more applications than opportunities in each class. “But now you have to actually recruit,” he said. “You have to actually form a relationship with students. You have to communicate and follow up and reduce barriers.” Yet Mills said in May that he is doubtful SSU will ever get back to its peak enrollment of more than 9,000 students, at least not for more than a decade, based on population figures. He said students are not coming from Southern California to SSU in the numbers they used to, but he pointed out there is increased interest from prospective students in the South Bay, the Sacramento area, San Joaquin County and the Delta region.
Writing on the wall As a former lecturer at SSU, Corinne Asturias worked closely for five years with students in the communications department— helping them produce the student newspaper, the Sonoma State Star, every week for a total of 14 issues each semester. She spent a lot of time lobbying to keep the paper going to benefit the students, she says. “But it was also good for the university. The paper made the campus look cool and it was a recruitment tool. It would bring in students who were checking out different campuses, and it helped that we had a thriving newspaper.” Asturias says it was the Star’s job to report what was going on around the university. “But I don’t think the administration appreciated some of it. The paper was protected by the integrity of the people in the communications department and some members of the administration, but that’s a pretty thin shield.” The number of students under her tutelage decreased somewhat during her time at the university. “When I started I had about 35 students and when I left five years later that was down to 25. There is no journalism major offered at Sonoma State, and there didn’t seem to be any interest in adding a journalism program on the part of the administration.” Ultimately, she adds, the cost of producing the school paper continually increased. “And what complicated our situation was when the Press Democrat closed its printing plant and we had to choose to either piggyback with its new printer or find another printer. So I set out to find us another printer. We reduced the size of our page and made other modifications to keep publishing, but our budget was so low compared to some
November 2025
NorthBaybiz 53
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