<p>Hello to all Amherst students</p>
<p>I would appreciate hearing from all current students with their evaluation of both student and faculty reaction to the Business Week article concerning President Marx’s goal of increasing enrollment of low income applicants and its effect on the college. What has the President indicated as to the reality of his goals and the accuracy of the article? Is there concern on campus? Thank you for responding. Dana’s Dad</p>
<p>There has been a furor of debate on campus. You may have already seen this article from the newspaper, but here it is for reference:</p>
<p>There is concern on campus; the BusinessWeek article has a pecular way of cropping up in students' conversations. I was at the Committee of Academic Priorities meeting yesterday, with President Marx, and he started off by debunking a lot of BusinessWeek's claims. He reassured us that he is not interested in jeopardizing Amherst's rankings or lowering standards.</p>
<p>BusinessWeek claimed that Amherst was saving 25% of its slots to students poor enough for a Pell Grant, and expanding overall admissions by 120 students for low-income students. In reality, we are hoping only to add 25 spots to each class. The college, overall, does feel that it's important to strive for socioeconomic diversity. But, as Marx put it, we're not interested in diversity of intellectual firepower. The spots are not giveaways. But the college is trying to make more students from the rest of the population be aware of Amherst and its capacity for generous financial aid.</p>
<p>Said President Marx: "The article was the first time I heard of such a thing. Journalism does sensationalize. The piece of the article I found most unfortunate: it thought it fair to caricature students to imply that legacies, athletes, or minorities dont meet the high standards of the College. Students here compete for these spots. We value all our students who are here, and do not take kindly to the disparagement implied by the article."</p>
<p>The BusinessWeek article really oversimplified everything; one athlete or one legacy or one minority who had a tough background etc. is not all that Amherst is comprised of.</p>
<p>Basically students have been poking fun at BW, arguing amongst themselves, and the like.</p>
<p>Is the reality that 25 to 50 additional students may be added to any new class and that those spots will specifically be reserved for economically disadvantaged students thus leading to a larger class? Or does it mean that from the regular number of admits 25 to 50 more of that static number will be economically disadvantaged thus reducing the number of other types of fully qualified students? I saw alot of verbiage in the student newspaper of sacrifice to meet an ultimate goal of economic diversity. What sacrifices and who will be those who are asked to sacrifice? Will there be a concommitant increase in faculty to handle the larger class size? Will the changes be gradual or sudden? Will the endowment budget focus more on financing the increased needs of the new students? And hey what about the desire for more international students that I am reading about? Also it was noted that girls are making up 55% of small lac application and that boys will be the new minority. If all of this plays out will the new urm in 10 years be caucasion girls from upper middle class families ? I find the long range planning very substantive and interesting. I am curious how it will play out. How will the alumni view the changes? The president should write a response with his goals made specific. Dana's Dad</p>
<p>How can admission officers identify these kids? Isn't the application process need-blind?</p>
<p>From what I have read the admissions people pre-identify these students thru regional research and demographic studies. The school then may reach out thru the high schools or mailings and invite these kids.</p>
<p>According to President Marx about need-blind applications at Amherst: what need-blind means is that inability to pay doesn't mean an inability to attend. However, if you don't have enough $ to pay for an SAT tutor, participate in summer programs, etc. the adcoms will take that into account.</p>
<p>The school is hoping to increase each class (I believe in about 10 yrs) by about 25 students in order to make the classes a little more diverse and because there will be room due to the Residential Master Plan. Professors will be increased by numbers and diversity. What this means is that if a department finds a exceptional candidate who offers diversity and a new perspective in a year where the department is not authorized to make a hire, they will get a debit of sorts from their hiring capacity. And when hiring time comes around, they'll have gotten the professor that they wanted a few years early. </p>
<p>The president has a response here: <a href="http://www.amherst.edu/%7Ecap/business_week_response.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.amherst.edu/~cap/business_week_response.html</a></p>