UMES Responds to Hawks for Football

Princess Anne, Md- The University of Maryland Eastern Shore is responding to comments made by non-profit Hawks for Football, in which the group stated that a lack of division 1 sports at the school was causing a downward trend in enrollment and funding that the school receives from the state.

Hawks for Football believes that having football return to UMES will bring a major boost to enrollment at the school, and provide additional funding with that boost in enrollment.

HFF President Wayne Jearld was quoted in saying that UMES is seen as a “Non-Growth Institution” which is why other universities are seeing more money invested into their school compared to UMES.

However UMES officials are claiming otherwise.

In a statement from UMES the school states that Hawks for Football is basing their comments off of outdated information, and that they are “an organization in search of a problem.”

We sat down Associate President of Marketing and External Affairs of UMES Robert Harty who reverberated the statements made by the university, while also taking a moment to praise the group:

“Its important to underscore the passion our alumni have, I think without that passion you lose something in the mix. Its important to see that this organization and other like it really care passionately about this place.”

“We’re the only university in the university system of Maryland that has seen 3 straight years of enrollment growth since 2021… this fall in 2023 we saw an over 13% increase in enrollment growth — that’s about 460 additional students that weren’t on this campus 4 years ago.”

Not only has the school seen an upward trend in enrollment over the past 3 years following a decrease UMES and almost every other university in the nation saw during the pandemic, but according to Harty UMES anticipates that they will continue to see that growth into 2024.

You can look into the story we previously posted about Hawks for Football here.