IU, Purdue exceed expected number of incoming freshman in 2012 class

To some, this University is known as Good Ole IU. To others it’s the former “No. 1 party school” in the nation, and for many it’s the home of the Hoosiers.

But to 40,354 students, IU is currently known as home.

IU and Purdue University recently released figures about their freshman classes and enrollments. Both schools exceeded the number of students they expected, but IU outnumbered Purdue in freshman class size: 7,564 newcomers on campus.

“The last couple years we have been pleasantly surprised about the number of students showing up after being accepted,” said IU spokesman Larry MacIntyre. “We’re very proud of the quality of the incoming freshman classes. We’ve got more academically accomplished students, more academically talented students. It’s a very good thing for IU.”

As for Purdue, 7,063 freshmen joined the Boilermaker ranks. Purdue’s current enrollment of 40,090 is the highest ever.

“A lot of the increase is spread over the entire University,” said Pam Horne, assistant vice president for enrollment management and dean of admissions at Purdue. “There isn’t really one large bulge of students. It makes things a little easier to manage. Both Purdue and Indiana did really well this year. We can be proud to have two great institutions in the state.”

Sixty-two percent of both IU and Purdue’s freshman classes are Indiana residents, with 4,679 and 4,361 residents, respectively.

“The single most notable thing about this incoming freshman class is the high number of Indiana students,” MacIntyre said. “In the last couple of years IU-Bloomington has focused a lot more of its scholarship assets on Indiana students. As a state institution, our mission is to serve Indiana and we really are serving about the maximum number of Indiana’s top high school students. We really think that is significant.”

Although her class is smaller than IU’s, freshman Boilermaker Alaina VornDran is happy at Purdue.

“I love the campus.” VornDran said. “I really like the stuff that Purdue has done towards making me feel at home, like I really belong here, definitely a very warm feeling.”

Similarly, Hoosier freshman Tim Cash loves IU.

“I’m happy with the class size because you get a lot more diversity; it gives you a lot more options of people to meet,” Cash said. “I love it here. The reason I came here was because of the great opportunities the University offers.”

With more opportunities on campus, IU’s standards are rising. While the current national SAT scores have been lowering, the scores of students admitted to IU has been rising. Compared to the average national composite SAT score, IU is considerably above the national and state marks, coming in at 1151 whereas the national average is 1017 and the state average is 1004.

IU’s selection process is also becoming stricter. Currently, 73 percent of IU’s freshmen in-state students graduated at the top 25 percent of their high school class.

“It’s more competitive. If you’re marginally successful in high school and you don’t have a particularly good SAT, chances are good you are not going to be accepted here at Bloomington,” MacIntyre said.

Among many out-of-state students, IU is known as the up-and-coming public university or the “new Wisconsin,” according to the Wall Street Journal’s article “From Bloomingdale’s to Bloomington.” IU is receiving a large amount of national recognition, both as a result of academics and athletics, through these out-of-state students.

The students who are accepted from out-of-state are welcomed at IU. Since IU has students from both in-state and out-of-state, IU will not be turning into the “new University of Texas,” where 94 percent of students come from within the state.

“We believe that the educational experience is better if there are both in-state, out-of-state, plus international students,” MacIntyre said. “IU would not be the great place if it was all in-state students. We need that mix.”

The school prides itself on serving Indiana.

“We want to serve as many of Indiana’s top high school students as we possibly can.” MacIntyre said. “We think we’re really serving the state best by educating as many students as possible in the top 25 percent of their graduating class.”