Notre Dame Student Deferrals and Remote Instruction

“For the past several weeks, the Academic Reopening Subcommittee, in partnership with the Division of Student Affairs and others, has been discussing how to address the concerns of students who for various reasons are unable to attend classes in person during the fall semester. Recommendations from this collective effort were recently adopted in a new policy for student accommodations. Any student requesting to take courses remotely should contact the Sara Bea Center for Student Accessibility Services. Advisors at the center will work individually and iteratively with students and their colleges or schools to arrive at reasonable accommodations. Given the University’s emphasis on holistic formation, fully remote instruction will not be offered to first-year undergraduate students, but these students will be able to defer their matriculation until Fall 2021.”

@hpcsa - I wonder if this will apply to International freshman? There have been so many visa issues, outside the control of the school and the student, this sounds like an option they can pursue.

@usma87 Just my 2 cents worth: International Students residing outside of the US who won’t be able to arrive on campus in time for the Fall semester, due to issues with obtaining their student visa and/or current travel restrictions, will need to defer for a year. International First-Year students already residing in the US, i.e. children of non-immigrant parents etc, will be expected, as US Students, to live on-campus.

The preparatory timeline, for both US and International Students is pretty compressed anyhow, for example:

"RECEIVING YOUR TESTING KIT

Prior to your return, University Health Services (UHS) physicians will order a COVID-19 PCR home collection test kit for each student. The home collection kit will be sent to your home (or the location you designate below) from our testing partner, LabCorp, who will provide the kits and process the results. Please review the address confirmation details at the end of this letter before Monday, July 13 to ensure your test is sent to the right location. Because testing kits cannot be shipped outside the United States, international students will receive a supplemental set of instructions later this week about their pre-matriculation testing options."

@hpcsa - yeah, I saw the guidance on the test kits. My DS is in Band. They are moving in Aug 2. We should be seeing that test kit in the next week or so.

@usma87 Yes, it will be tight. DD’s move-in date is Sunday, July 26th - will be interesting to see how the test result process will be playing out.

Number of admitted Notre Dame students taking a gap year increased to around 80 students this year, compared to around 20 students under normal circumstances, a quite low number for the 2,150 First-Year Notre Dame students starting classes on Monday, August 10th. Concerns in this respect were largely overblown. In fact, Notre Dame ended up somewhat overenrolling for the Class of 2024, expecting a potential decrease in yield, which also did not occur. Therefore the incoming class will be at least 100 students larger than last year’s incoming class - possibly noticeably larger, subject to some international students arriving still over the coming weeks, due to visa issuance/travel delays.

@hpcsa - I’m curious where you were able to find stats on the number of students taking a gap year and the final tally of incoming freshmen?

If ND pulled more off the waitlist this year than in prior years, it strikes me as odd that they’d end up over-enrolled? Wouldn’t they be able to mete out their admissions off the waitlist after enrollments were known on May 1?

@hatchette I agree with your perpspective. Notre Dame hit the waitlist early this year, to the best of my knowledge - and did not wait until May 31st to commence this process. Especially given the housing issues to be expected with the likely cancellation of study abroad programs, I would think avoiding an overenrollment situation would have been at the forefront of admission’s efforts. Having said that, growing the class a bit, I think, is something that the university is focused on. They have been building housing to meet such future needs. Just perhaps not the year to start! All seems under control at this point.

I’m glad that yields stayed high and gap years were lower than anticipated. On any basis and in any year, kids want to come to Notre Dame!

@hatchette Predicting that COVID-19 would decrease the yield rate of first-year students, the University offered a few hundred more acceptances than in previous years; however, more students enrolled than anticipated. The incoming class is expected to be at least 100 students larger than last year’s incoming class.

Notre Dame also welcomed about 100 more transfer students than usual this year. Typically about half of the transfers come through the Holy Cross Gateway program with Notre Dame and the other half through external transfers from other academic institutions. In light of COVID-19, this year’s enrollment target for transfer students increased to 250 from the usual 150 students.