Data were extracted from issues of the Directory for five different years: 1977, 1981, 1984, 1987, and 1989. The two categories of interest were total enrollment in all geography courses and enrollment in regional courses on Latin America listed under the titles of The Geography of "Latin America," "Central America/Caribbean," and "South America."

Several criteria were used to determine if an entry should be included in the database:

1) The courses were taught in a unit identified as a Department of Geography, Geosciences, or Earth Sciences. Though the departmental name selection is somewhat arbitrary, these terms were thought to be representative of titles that most would associate with programs reflecting traditional geography. Separating enrollment in courses that included geographical content but taught in departments of geology, environmental science, ecological studies and so on, proved to be difficult. If "geography" was part of a compound name, the data were included in the study.

2) Total geography enrollment in 1977 or either 1987 or 1989 equalled or exceeded 500 students per year. This restriction ensured that only departments of a significant current size or a significant size at the beginning of the period of interest were included. Incorporating data from all schools would have made the compilation task far more difficult and, it might be argued, reduced the effectiveness of the study.

3) Only those schools that reported geography enrollment for all of the periods are included. A problem in collecting the data is that a department may fail to return the questionnaire during a given period, in which case the totals for the previous year are used. If the questionnaire is not returned during three successive years, the school entry is dropped completely from the directory. Where response to the questionnaire has lapsed, therefore, geography departments are not listed for one or more years, and the inclusion of these schools with a value of zero does not reflect reality. The data included with this report, therefore, omits all programs that failed to be listed for any of the years under consideration. Some comments on the more extensive database (including the schools with missing entries) will be made following a presentation of the more restricted grouping.

RESULTS

The data are presented in Table 1, sorted by decreasing enrollment in Latin America related courses in 1989. As indicated by the totals, overall growth in geography from 1977 to 1989 has been a moderate 8.3 percent for departments using traditional titles and returning data since 1977. The 39 percent increase in Latin America related courses is much greater. The increase in enrollment, however, has not been matched by a comparable increase in the number of schools offering Latin American geography. In 1977, 101 schools provided a regional course covering the area, but in 1989 the number had dropped to 88. The data may reflect a waning popularity of regional courses in general as well as waxing emphasis and expansion at a few universities. The growth in relation to the overall geography enrollment at the University of Minnesota, Arizona State University, Michigan State University and others is striking.

In the larger database (including all schools that satisfied criteria 1 and 2 but with missing entries), the totals were expectedly greater (shown in Table 2). The overall trend in enrollment in Latin America related courses, however, was similar to the data presented in Table 1.

IMPLICATIONS

The Geographical Studies and Research Center. 1977-1989. Schwendeman's directory of college geography of the United States. Richmond, KY: Department of Geography and Planning, Eastern Kentucky University.