Newsletter

A letter from Lisa

September 2025  

Can you feel the energy? Maybe it’s because La Crosse is seeing more Eagles than ever, and I’m not talking about the national bird. UW-La Crosse is once again celebrating an enrollment milestone. Preliminary estimates show that UWL has welcomed the largest first-year class in its history.

The reason? One could assume that for some students, it’s because UWL is once again being named among the Midwest’s best! The university has earned high marks in the 2026 U.S. News & World Report Best Colleges rankings – standing out as one of the top universities in the region for academic excellence, student success and overall value.

What does this mean for our region? High-quality graduates. What’s even more exciting is that many of them stay in La Crosse and contribute to our regional workforce. UWL’s most current data on undergraduate alumni who earned a bachelor’s degree in the 2023-2024 academic year indicates that while 12% of the alumni had home addresses in the Coulee Region, the number of students staying in the region after graduation was 33%. For some of them, those job opportunities presented themselves when students transitioned from interns to employees.

What’s next? UWL will continue to pursue the next level of excellence while expanding community partnerships to help meet the region’s needs and provide a skilled workforce. University leaders are collaborating with colleagues across campus to develop the institution’s next strategic plan to take us to 2030 and beyond.

In partnership,

Lisa 