The College has received deposits from 543 students for the Class of 2005, which after “summer melt” should put the new class on its target for 520, reports Dan Lundquist, vice president for admissions and financial aid.
“Our goals this year were to maximize academic quality and admissions selectivity,” Lundquist said. “To attain those goals, we admitted 350 fewer students from the lower end of the academic scale and provided some merit money to the top-end admits. Our selectivity dropped from 47 to 40 percent and the yield increased on the top academic bands.”
The Union Scholars program, for example, has grown from 38 to 51 students in the past year, he noted.
At the same time, the College was able to contain the overall financial aid expenditure for the class. “A better-qualified and more affluent applicant pool has presented itself the past two years and we have been able to capitalize on that,” Lundquist said.
The only disappointment in an “otherwise splendid year” is that applications, admission, and matriculation of minority students are down from 14 percent last year to 12 percent this year, Lundquist said.