Enrollment Trends at Northwestern

Student Population Changes

The average student population over the last 11 years is 1,445 where 1,705 students are attending the school for the academic year 2024-2025.

69.44% of total students is undergraduate students and 30.56% students is graduate students. The number of undergraduate students has increased by 64 and the graduate enrollment has increased by 431 over past 10 years.

The female to male ratio is 1.51 to 1 and it means that there are more female students enrolled in Northwestern than male students.

The following table and chart illustrate the changes in student population by gender at Northwestern College since 2015.

• Trends Table
• By Gender Chart
• By Level Chart
• Downloadable Chart

Year	Total	Undergraduate			Graduate
		Total	Men	Women	Total	Men	Women
2015-16	1,210	1,120	474	646	90	6	84
2016-17	1,252 42	1,091 -29	477 3	614 -32	161 71	12 6	149 65
2017-18	1,243 -9	1,041 -50	452 -25	589 -25	202 41	22 10	180 31
2018-19	1,299 56	1,024 -17	452	572 -17	275 73	39 17	236 56
2019-20	1,412 113	1,061 37	477 25	584 12	351 76	69 30	282 46
2020-21	1,496 84	1,069 8	517 40	552 -32	427 76	90 21	337 55
2021-22	1,513 17	1,053 -16	513 -4	540 -12	460 33	112 22	348 11
2022-23	1,651 138	1,153 100	537 24	616 76	498 38	108 -4	390 42
2023-24	1,665 14	1,146 -7	541 4	605 -11	519 21	113 5	406 16
2024-25	1,705 40	1,184 38	564 23	620 15	521 2	116 3	405 -1
Average	1,445	1,094	500	594	350	69	282

Undergraduate Enrollment Changes

The average number of Undergraduate students over the last 11 years is 1,094 where 1,184 students are attending the Undergraduate school for the academic year 2024-2025. The following table and chart illustrate the changes in Undergraduate enrollment by attending status and gender at Northwestern College since 2015.

• Trends Table
• By Gender Chart
• By Status Chart
• Downloadable Chart

Year	Total	Full-time			Part-time
		Total	Men	Women	Total	Men	Women
2015-16	1,120	1,062	451	611	58	23	35
2016-17	1,091	1,045	457	588	46	20	26
2017-18	1,041	997	438	559	44	14	30
2018-19	1,024	949	443	506	75	9	66
2019-20	1,061	968	463	505	93	14	79
2020-21	1,069	974	499	475	95	18	77
2021-22	1,053	979	503	476	74	10	64
2022-23	1,153	1,019	513	506	134	24	110
2023-24	1,146	1,020	522	498	126	19	107
2024-25	1,184	1,059	549	510	125	15	110
Average	1,094	1,094	484	523	1,094	17	70

Graduate Enrollment Changes

The average number of Graduate students over the last 11 years is 350 where 521 students are attending the Graduate school for the academic year 2024-2025. The following table and chart illustrate the changes in Graduate enrollment by attending status and gender at Northwestern College since 2015.

• Trends Table
• By Gender Chart
• By Status Chart
• Downloadable Chart

Year	Total	Full-time			Part-time
		Total	Men	Women	Total	Men	Women
2015-16	90	1	0	1	89	6	83
2016-17	161	1	0	1	160	12	148
2017-18	202	6	1	5	196	21	175
2018-19	275	12	2	10	263	37	226
2019-20	351	13	2	11	338	67	271
2020-21	427	51	10	41	376	80	296
2021-22	460	87	18	69	373	94	279
2022-23	498	96	20	76	402	88	314
2023-24	519	124	32	92	395	81	314
2024-25	521	114	27	87	407	89	318
Average	350	350	11	39	350	58	242

Enrollment by Race/Ethnicity Changes

The percentage of white students is 83.64%. The percentage was 83.47% 10 years ago and Northwestern still has a high percentage of white students. 1.23% of enrolled students is Asian and 1.17% is black students. Hispanic students comprise 4.99% of the student body.

Over the past 10 years, the racial composition has shifted. The percentage of white students increased from 83.47% to 83.64%. Asian enrollment grew from 0.99% to 1.23%. Black student enrollment decreased from 1.90% to 1.17%. Hispanic student representation expanded from 4.21% to 4.99%.

The overall racial diversity, measured by the Census Bureau Diversity Index, is 0.2976 which indicates that not very diverse. This decreased from 0.3006 a decade ago, suggesting that racial diversity has declined.

The following table and chart illustrate the student population trends by race/ethnicity at Northwestern College over the past 11 years (2015-2025).

• Trends Table
• Interactive Chart
• Downloadable Chart

Year	American Indian or Native American	Asian	Black	Hispanic	Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander	White	Two or More Races
	2015-16	0	12	23	51	1	1,010	25
2016-17	4	11	18	54	0	1,042	25
2017-18	5	15	15	45	0	1,054	16
2018-19	4	12	23	47	0	1,103	19
2019-20	3	11	20	59	0	1,145	23
2020-21	2	14	22	64	0	1,166	23
2021-22	4	18	22	86	0	1,143	17
2022-23	3	16	27	78	0	1,208	16
2023-24	2	14	24	78	1	1,235	12
2024-25	3	21	20	85	0	1,426	21
Average	3	14	21	65	0	1,153	20