DAVID WALKER/FAIRFAX NZ

Canterbury University vice-chancellor Rod Carr says overall enrolment figures will continue an upward trend in 2016.

Student numbers at Canterbury's tertiary institutions have jumped as the sector recovers from huge drops after the region's earthquakes.

Canterbury University lost more than a fifth of its students after the September 2010 earthquake, dropping from 18,783 students in 2010 to 14,725 in 2014. 

The numbers began to climb back up last year, when 14,830 students enrolled at the university, and enrolment numbers were expected to rise again this year, vice-chancellor Rod Carr said. 

The number of new equivalent full time students had already climbed 13 per cent from 2015, with a further 380 fresh students enrolling in 2016. 

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Carr said Canterbury University had been fighting a post-earthquake trend of local students leaving town to study elsewhere.  

"In 2014, they wanted to leave Christchurch and went to Wellington, Otago and into the workforce. Now we're retaining Christchurch school leavers and we're getting our fair share of provincial students, as well as attracting greater numbers from the Auckland region."

He said expensive Auckland rent prices had lured more students to Christchurch.

"Living on or near the UC campus, and having a lifestyle that can take you from lectures to skifields in 90 minutes or the beach in 20 minutes, is much more appealing and affordable than living in Auckland."

An official head count would not be released until enrolments closed on March 11, but it was "fair to say that the recovery is accelerating year on year", Carr said.

Lincoln University also experienced a hefty drop in enrolments after Canterbury's earthquakes, but the number of full-time students enrolling in 2016 was up 4.7 per cent from the 1506 it had in March 2015.  

Final numbers would be confirmed by the end of March. 

"The growth in numbers is welcome at Lincoln University to address skills shortages in the land-based sectors – as well as to meet the University's own targets to continue to strengthen the institution post-earthquakes," vice-chancellor Robin Pollard said.

The number of new equivalent full time students for semester one had increased by 10 per cent from 356 last year to 393 in 2016, excluding qualifications that were level 4 or lower. 

The student population at Christchurch Polytechnic Institute of Technology (CPIT) was boosted by 13 per cent after its merger with Aoraki Polytechnic.

In March 2015, CPIT alone had 4595 equivalent full time students, while in 2016 the number jumped to to 5194. 

Numbers were expected to increase at the polytechnic over the year as many programmes had mid-year intakes. 

 - Stuff