Enrollment Surge

Post World War I enrollment surge doubled VPI’s student body. (Virginia Tech historic enrollment data found here)

In the years after the First World War, Virginia Polytechnic Institute’s student enrollment dramatically increased. Student enrollment, which remained around 500 students between 1914 and spring 1919, doubled to nearly 1000 students by 1921 and exceeded 1000 students by 1924.

 The reasons for VPI’s expanding student enrollment were directly related to the war.

1. Some VPI students, who would have graduated from VPI 1918 and 1919, interrupted their studies prematurely to enter the military. After being discharged, many returned to VPI to finish their degrees.

2. The Soldier’s Vocational Rehabilitation Act, passed by Congress in 1918, afforded wounded veterans funds to attend vocational institutions. As early as the 1920-1921 academic year at least 54 veterans who were not previously enrolled at VPI were students because of this program. Among them was Sergeant Earle Gregory, who was wounded in the Meuse-Argonne Offensive. Gregory received the Medal of Honor for single-handedly capturing 23 German soldiers and multiple enemy fortifications with nothing but a rifle and trench mortars which he used as grenades.

Sergeant Earle D. Gregory in his VPI uniform wearing the Medal of Honor and other battle medals he received during WW1, c. 1921-22. (Image: Library of Virginia)

3. Through Students’ Army Training Corps over 452 college-aged draftees received military training at VPI in the fall of 1918 alongside VPI’s 477 regular student body. When the SATC program was terminated in January 1919, a number of SATC student-soldiers returned to VPI the subsequent academic year as regular students.   

4. Between 1914 and 1918 the United States benefited financially from the war. Even before American intervention, the American economy grew as manufacturing increased to supply European armies and allied powers increasingly relied on American loans. Those families who benefited from rising wages and salaries may have been able to afford a higher education for their children.

The post-World War I enrollment surge at VPI was one of only three major enrollment surges in Virginia Tech’s history which doubled the student population. The first occurred in the late 1890s and the last occurred in the aftermath of World War II.