Tulane, GW, Mac all have larger higher enrollments this year. Some schools are just hotter than others this year. Goes in waves.
I wonder if these over enrollments aren’t because the year 2000 was a high birth year.
Purdue overenrolled this year as well. Yield was much higher than predicted.
Davidson had its lowest acceptance rate (19%) and highest yield (almost 47%) rate ever for Class of 2002 but managed to land with 517 first-years out of target 500 which seems pretty good. Last Spring they converted lounges and basement rooms for student use, but it was upperclassmen returning from Fall study abroad who ended up in these spots. No dorm crowding issues for first-years.
This can be bad news for Purdue students trying to get into competitive majors after enrolling. That may include first year engineering students who need to compete with each other by college GPA to get into their desired majors.
Don’t know about majors, but check out these temporary dorms they had to set up: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/tanyachen/people-horrified-by-temporary-housing-purdue-university
Mount Holyoke announced today this was their largest class ever. Smith, Barnard, and Bryn Mawr all have had record class sizes this year. Maybe lots of 2000 births and year of the dragon.
Holy Cross is over enrolled again. 870 kids, last year was 820 and the usual target is around 780
The auxiliary dorm at Purdue looks like it would actually offer more privacy and single-occupancy space than a lot of freshman doubles and triples do. I’d mostly be worried about noise and light in a large room like that. The area for each student looks just fine.
From what I’m hearing on our parent group, most students in temporary housing at Purdue have already been moved into permanent accommodations.
Purdue hired more profs and TAs to avoid issues with classes. They also haven’t changed the target for engineering transition to major requirements.
Meanwhile many lower tier schools really struggling. A rush to quality/safety.
Because of cost. Many really low ranked schools (in non city locations) are too expensive even at the discounted rate. Private schools in hot locations (cities and college towns) and public flagships are growing.
@Empireapple I have been saying this for years!! My BFF thinks I’m crazy. I swear that I noticed it even when buying baby clothes. Stores constantly ran out of their year/size. I’m pretty worried about this coming year, but hoping it eases off a bit. Also, my girls were born very early and coincided with blizzard babies here in North Carolina so there was overcrowding everywhere.
When you do it 3 years in a row, it is no longer an accident (or the school needs to admit it doesn’t know how to hit a target).
My law school went over by and entire section (84 students) one year. It sent out letters saying that wouldn’t happen again and they lowered (a lot) the number of acceptances, and then filled the class from the waitlist.
In Drexel’s case they BPRed their enrollment and retention strategy and then saw a drop with the 2020 Class which really turned out to be more because Temple and PSU offered crazy Merit to that class especially Temple. It cost Senior officials their jobs at Temple.
Purdue. Huge housing problems
University of Maryland also overenrolled given the number of students that needed to be placed into flex triples/quads or in converted lounges or not able to get housing at all.
https://sf.curbed.com/2018/9/4/17819898/ucsc-housing-faculty-crisis-santa-cruz-students-roommates
UCSC is so overcrowded this year they sent out an email to faculty and staff asking them to house students.
University of Maryland offered a financial incentive to upperclassmen to abandon their housing contract to free up space for freshman, unfortunately not enough took it. Similar to what Penn State did with its class of 2020 where it offered them a financial incentive to start at a branch campus instead of main campus. However it seems like they never make these incentives big enough to really free up the space they need.
The problem with UC Santa Cruz is not over-enrollment, but the expensive tight housing market in Santa Cruz and all the rest of the SF Bay Area.