Georgia Southern University is closing the gap between this year’s summer enrollment numbers and last year’s numbers with help from the “I Heart Summer” campaign and human resource’s summer job fair.

“About four weeks ago we were down about sixteen hundred students compared to the previous year. Right now we are close to around five hundred down,” Dr. Teresa Thompson, vice president of student affairs and enrollment management, said.

The job fair for summer employment had a considerable turnout. About 420 students attended the event, Rieshawn Williams, human resources coordinator, said.

“We also had a really good turnout from the number of departments that have attended, and we had a fairly decent number of students that have been hired,” Demetrius Bynes, director of employment services, said.

Some of the departments are still working through the process of hiring because so many students attended that day, Bynes said.

“This was our first job fair that was addressing summer hiring,” Williams said.

Thompson said that turnout was not only due to the job fair, but academic affairs has done a really good job in helping students understand the support GSU has to offer them in fining ways to pay for expenses.

“We created a situation where students didn’t have to go from office-to-office asking about positions. You had everybody in one place and that was very helpful,” Thompson said.

“And obviously the numbers show when you go from sixteen hundred to five hundred,” Thompson said.

The summer enrollment campaign has received positive feedback from students, and parents were pleased that there was a job fair for summer employment, Thompson said.

The summer job fair shows that GSU is student-centered and is concerned about the methods that students pay for their expenses, which is a big factor on whether a student attends summer school or not, Thompson said.

For students who have missed the summer job fair, there is another fair scheduled for April 23 for Eagle Dining, which will not only have fall semester opportunities but opportunities for the summer term as well, Bynes said.

Thompson said, “What we are trying to do as an institution is help students graduate on time, if at all possible, and summer school has to be a part of that.”