<p>502 names are listed in the class facebook for 2014. Personally, I’m worried about it not feeling cozy enough within my class, but aside from that, does anyone have a guess as to how logistical issues will work out, regarding dorm space, demand for classes versus the cap on class sizes, etc.?</p>
<p>Well, I’d just like to point out that not all those people are coming. I actually know of 3 people who got off the waitlist elsewhere, and changed their minds at the last minute. So, honestly, I think the class size will come down.</p>
<p>But to answer your actual question, you will be just fine. Because in reality, if all 502 people showed up (they won’t), that’s still only 500 people. I don’t know if you went to a really rural highschool, but how many kids were in your highschool? My highschool class, personally, was 600, and I felt plenty cozy. Everyone knew everyone.</p>
<p>They created more freshman dorms this year, so that shouldn’t be a problem. Class size is going to go up, I believe. I think the average class size this year will about 20, as opposed to 15. And for the popular classes, you’ll have about 50 people, maybe.</p>
<p>It’ll all be just fine. To be honest, I like this.</p>
<p>Thanks, I didn’t know the cap had increased. </p>
<p>It really comes down to personal preference. I think I’d be more comfortable with just 400-something classmates, but c’est la vie. My high school class had almost 700 people, and part of the reason why I felt intimidated by the sheer number of classmates was because everyone changed their schedules at the start of a new semester, and most people’s lunch periods would change, too. The fact that we’ll all be living together will probably make the size more manageable for me, but I’ll have to see about that.</p>
<p>Yeah, I suppose it ultimately depends on personal preference.</p>
<p>With that being said, congrats to us, Amherst Class of 2014 :)</p>
<p>You mean this group?</p>
<p>[Login</a> | Facebook](<a href=“http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=lf#!/group.php?gid=317555425149]Login”>http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=lf#!/group.php?gid=317555425149)</p>
<p>Note that many of the people in your Class group may be spammers.</p>
<p>I only see 410 members??</p>
<p>Kwu-What about that group? I think he was referring to the actual Class Facebook, located on the Amherst website.</p>
<p>Hahahahaha-</p>
<p>Read what I said about to KWU. You wouldn’t be able to see said class facebook, unless you were part of the class of 2014.</p>
<p>No, I can access it.</p>
<p>I count 501… which is outrageous, given the exactitude with which the Admission Office has managed to maintain the College’s yield at 38 percent, more or less, for the past several years.</p>
<p>I doubt we’ll lose 36 students from summer melt to the Ivy League, Williams and Swarthmore, so I take it this was an intentional move on the part of the committee.</p>
<p>You have a good point.</p>
<p>I don’t entirely dislike the idea of having more students. I was/am afraid I might feel too stifled. I agree that is intentional. Perhaps because of an endowment situation. I don’t think the entire college population will go over 2,000, however. I’m fine with that, because as I said, I went to what some might call a bigger highschool, and I knew everyone.</p>
<p>The enrollment at Amherst has increased every year since 2005, according to the school’s Common Data Sets: </p>
<p>1,744 Fall 2009
1,697 Fall 2008
1,683 Fall 2007
1,648 Fall 2006
1,623 Fall 2005</p>
<p>Based on posts info above, it seems likely that the number will be higher again in Fall 2010, probably closer to 1,800. That number could rise higher, if Amherst continues to admit classes in the 475-500 range. </p>
<p>Enrollment of 1,800 or 1,900 is still quite moderate for a selective liberal arts college (for comparison, Williams was at 2,067 in Fall 2009, and Middlebury was at 2,482). The question is whether growth in enrollment is accompanied by a corresponding increase in faculty and other resources. One way for schools to address budgetary problems is to increase enrollment (and therefore tuition revenues) while holding the line on expenses (like faculty salaries). </p>
<p>I don’t have any inside information as to whether Amherst’s expansion has anything to do with this reason; it’s just one possibility</p>
<p>This is no big surprise. nearly a year ago Amherst College announced a signficant increase in the size of the student body as a component of the budget cutting plans. If I recall, the plan is to increase enrollment by 200 students within the next couple of years. I was never able to figure out what the baseline starting point was, but I believe the new plan is for Amherst to have 1850 students.</p>
<p>A second major component was the cancellation of the previously approved faculty expansion. If I recall (don’t hold me to the exact numbers), 13 of the 16 new tenure track slots were cancelled. So, the growth in the size of the student body will take place without significant numbers of new faculty.</p>
<p>I’ve been suggesting for quite some time that prospective students pay attention to the budget cutting plans at every college on their list because, almost without exception, everything that was there last year or the year before won’t necessarily be there over the next four years. Amherst has a particularly acute liquidity problem due to very high cash call commitments and a large percentage of the endowment invested in non-liquid assets. They had to borrow $100 million taxable debt to cover the cash needs, borrowing that will require approximately $5 million a year in interest costs over the next 30 years, thus putting an additional squeeze on the operating budget. The college is in no danger financially; it still has a very large per student endowment. There is some belt-tightening, however. Adding students without growing the faculty is part of that.</p>
<p>During the president’s remarks at orientation, some guy (I forgot his name) jokingly pleaded to have more students take a gap year. I’d prefer to think that the class size was accidental…</p>
<p>Edit after reading interesteddad’s post: That’s a real bummer.</p>
<p>Amherst provides admittance and enrollment stats for the past decade [url=<a href=“https://www.amherst.edu/media/view/181593]here[/url”>https://www.amherst.edu/media/view/181593]here[/url</a>].</p>
<p>Between 1999 and 2006, the number of incoming students was held within a very narrow range, between 412 and 434. So an incoming class size of roughly 425 was the “old normal”. </p>
<p>In 2007, the number of incoming students suddenly jumped to 474. It dropped back to 438 in 2008, but then rose to 467 in 2009. If the info above is accurate, it could approach 500 in 2010. </p>
<p>So three of the past four incoming classes have been in the high 400s, rather than the low 400s. My guess is that this represents the “new normal” for Amherst.</p>
<p>The old baseline was hard to pin down because the planned increase of 200 students was announced in two waves. The first announcement came before the market crash and was intended to increase the number of low-income students without cutting the number of traditional slots (read “recruited athletes”). This plan was highly touted as a Marx initiative, but was rendered moot by the market crash and pressure on the college budget. The original number was increased to a total of 200 additional students with the new plan of maintaining the original mix of aid versus full-pay. That announcment came last summer.</p>
<p>This is not to say that Amherst hasn’t simultaneously over-enrolled a freshman class. That happens. I must say, there does seem to have been a rash of schools saying, “oops, we accidentally overenrolled” since the market crash. I’m sure it’s a just a coincidence!</p>
<p>Actually, it’s a little difficult to get the real size of many colleges. The undergrad enrollment data in the Common Data Set should be cut and dried, but it’s not. For example, that data does not include study abroad students at many colleges (Williams and Amherst, for example), but does include study abroad students at other schools (Swarthmore, for example). That’s a signficant number of students and explains why the freshman classes often seem surprisingly large relative to the “reported” size of the student body.</p>