At last month’s University Senate meeting, a discussion began on the rising admissions rate over the past two years, prompting a wider university conversation.

Between fall 2008 and fall 2010, the admissions rate jumped from 52.5 percent to 59.7 percent, according to Syracuse University statistics provided by Kevin Quinn, senior vice president for public affairs. University officials attribute this increase to a rise in SU’s popularity and efforts to attract more students from a wider geographic range, specifically outside of the Northeast.

The admissions rate has fluctuated in the past decade. Comparing 2002’s 80.3 percent to today’s 60 percent shows a drop. But between that time, the percentages fell into the low 50s before rising again to 60.1 percent in fall 2009.

Both the number of applications and the number of students admitted have also increased in the past decade. In 2001, 12,917 applied to SU, and 9,221 were admitted. In 2010, 22,921 applied, and 13,676 were admitted.

The average high school GPA and SAT scores for admitted students have remained about the same in the past few years, fluctuating at about 3.60 and between 1160 and 1170, respectively.

Admissions are expanding as the university looks to recruit more students from various geographic, ethnic, racial and socioeconomic areas, said Don Saleh, vice president for enrollment management. Recently, the university has brought in more students from the American south and southwest, and the number of international students has also risen, Saleh said. Saleh said he would like to see the university continue to reflect the socioeconomic, racial and ethnic diversity of the country.

From 2001 to 2010, the percentage of admitted students from the Northeast dropped by nearly 6 percent, from 77.5 percent in 2001 to 71.6 percent in 2010.

Saleh said he ‘absolutely expects’ the admissions rate to drop to 55 percent or lower for the next year at SU, given the university is looking to enroll a smaller class and because the number of applicants has increased.

A discussion on campus about SU’s admissions process is good and should not be ignored, said Jerry Mager, chair of USen’s Administrative Operations Committee and associate dean in the School of Education.

‘It raises the question of, ‘Who do we think we are, where do we think we’re going, how do we think we’re going to get there?’ And those discussions are not always held,’ Mager said.

Mager said Saleh spoke with the Ad Op committee in December on the rising admissions rate after an inquiry from committee member and history professor David Bennett. Bennett wanted to know who on campus determined SU’s admissions process and strategy. Saleh spoke with the committee about the admissions rate, diversity of student enrollment and financial support for students, Mager said.

As the university reaches out to students from a broader geographic range, it’s necessary to admit more students from areas outside the Northeast, such as California, as they are less likely to accept, Saleh told the Ad Op committee. He also reported on a rise in students receiving Pell Grants.

Bennett, who initiated the Ad Op committee’s discussion with Saleh, brought up that meeting to further discuss it at the February USen meeting. USen members responded in a way that framed the discussion as one of diversity versus selectivity and SU’s reputation.

The issue is not about inclusivity versus selectivity, Bennett said. Rather, it’s about involving the entire university community in discussion on what a higher admissions rate means for SU.

Using U.S. News and World Report statistics that rank the nation’s colleges, Bennett pointed out that schools like Tulane University and George Washington University, typically grouped with SU, have risen above SU. Schools like Drexel University, typically grouped below SU, have also risen, he said. A fall in SU’s position could mean fewer students will be interested in the school, Bennett said, and fewer guidance counselors will recommend the university.

Bennett said he felt the university had changed its admissions goals of late, not to an institution that rejected selectivity but one that emphasized an effort to become more inclusive. He said he believes this is a noble goal but puts the university at risk and could affect the cache of a degree from the university. He also said he asked Saleh in their December meeting who was making the decision to move in the new direction, and Saleh said it was a small group that included himself, Vice Chancellor and Provost Eric Spina and Chancellor Nancy Cantor. Saleh said in an interview with The Daily Orange that many people across campus are involved in such discussions.

But Quinn, senior vice president for public affairs, said there is a constant ongoing discussion among the chancellor, deans and enrollment management staff on broadening the applicant base geographically and socioeconomically. The university is open to discussing the admissions rate, he said.

It is important to remember the university has admissions standards as a national, private institution, and any student who is accepted must meet those standards, Quinn said.

At the February USen meeting, Cantor spoke up and said SU has always been an inclusive institution, and having this diversity has allowed for a fuller college experience. The popularity of SU has been growing, Cantor said, and SU has been able to bring in students from a wide variety of backgrounds.

A ‘very important goal’ of the university is to grow the applicant pool, Saleh said. As more students are recruited, SU’s admissions rate will decline, Saleh said. SU would like to see an increase in the number of applicants, Saleh said, which would have the indirect effect of lowering the admissions rate.

It is important to separate the idea of being inclusive from the admissions rate, Saleh said. There could be a lower admissions rate if SU only admitted those in the immediate area, but that is not the university’s goal, Saleh said.

Admitting more students does not mean the university is sacrificing selectivity, said Douglas Biklen, dean of the School of Education. As more students are sought to attend the school, the admissions rate will go down, Biklen said. He said he and the other deans have discussed educational diversity with Cantor since Cantor came to SU six years ago.

SU is not lowering its standards by becoming more inclusive, Biklen said. The university has long been an institution that reaches out to students, Biklen said, citing how the school reached out to women, veterans and Jewish students before other universities.

‘Syracuse has a distinct role to play because it has this history of giving people a chance,’ Biklen said.

It’s plausible what the university is doing with the admissions process is working, but there needs to be a better explanation of what is going on, said Jeff Stonecash, a political science professor. Stonecash said he thought talking about the admissions rate in terms of diversity was a mechanism of shutting down discussion at the last USen meeting.

‘I’d like to have a real presentation on our admissions policy — why they think it’s going to work,’ he said.

Without a comprehensive look at all the data, it’s difficult to understand the situation, said Kenneth Johnson, an assistant professor of communication and rhetorical studies and a USen member.

Though Harvard University might have a significantly lower admissions rate, they also have a much larger and different applicant pool, Johnson said. That means comparing admissions rates between the schools is like ‘comparing apples to oranges,’ he said.

Johnson said he wasn’t concerned with the admissions rate, as long as SU was still abiding by admissions policies of accepting academically prepared students.

‘Unless they’ve thrown that all out and are just admitting anybody, I don’t see a problem,’ Johnson said.

Laura Heyman, an associate professor of art, design and transmedia, said she could see both sides of the admissions argument but found it difficult to have a discussion on the admissions process without looking at all the data. Heyman said she is not a USen member.

It is also difficult to think about admissions on the broad scale given how it affects campus groups differently, Heyman said. In the art program Heyman teaches, there has not been a problem with class sizes expanding as more students accept admissions to campus. But her department is small compared to the large undergraduate courses that are likely affected, she said.

Jonathan Massey, presiding officer of USen, said in an e-mail that he has had follow-up conversations with Bennett and others about the university’s admissions strategy. But because the next Senate Agenda Committee meeting has not met since the USen meeting on Feb. 16, Massey said they have not yet discussed the next step in putting a further discussion on admissions rates on the agenda for the next USen meeting on March 23.

dkmcbrid@syr.edu

Published on March 1, 2011 at 12:00 pm

Contact Dara: dkmcbrid@syr.edu | @daramcbride