Dartmouth probably wants to remain the smallest school in the Ivy League. This means that that the key variable determining the upper limit of any enrollment growth may be defined as the “Princeton Factor”.
According to College Navigator, Dartmouth had 4,310 undergrads for Fall 2106. If they bump that up by 25%, the total would rise to 5,387. They can’t go any higher than that – not even to 26% – because Princeton’s undergraduate enrollment was 5,400.
A moderate, manageable growth usually means a decrease in unit cost per student. It is also a good reason to have alumni to write some serious checks. Of course, devil is in details; it requires good execution.
Reminds me of that old joke: “Yeah, we lose money on every widget we sell, but we make it up in volume.”
When more than half of your students are on financial aid, (1) the bigger your class, the more you pay out in financial aid, and (2) the more services and support student will demand, since it’s someone else’s money.