If campus seems just a little more crowded this fall than it has been in the past, a bigger and brighter freshman class than the University has seen in years might explain that phenomenon.
Although official numbers won’t be available until the end of the fourth week of fall term — that’s when students tend to settle down after adding and dropping classes throughout the first few weeks — University officials expect the class of just over 1,900 resident and 707 nonresident freshmen to be the second-largest ever.
Thanks to those new faces on campus, University officials expect the total enrollment to jump from 17,278 last fall to about 17,700 this fall.
“This freshman class is by far larger than it was last year,” said Jim Buch, the University’s associate vice president for enrollment management. “I think that’s a direct reflection of the quality of the University.”
Buch said this fall’s freshman class is not only the largest since the record of just more than 2,800 set in 1988, but on average its members are also the smartest ever, averaging GPAs of 3.41 and Scholastic Achievement Test scores of 558.1 in the verbal section and 555.2 in math.
“Not only are the numbers up, but the quality is up as well,” Buch said.
He said he attributes the rise in high achievers among incoming freshmen to efforts in recruiting and the availability of scholarships designed to keep bright high school students in Oregon.
The Dean’s Scholarship, which is available to high school graduates whose transcripts show that they have completed challenging course work while maintaining a GPA of 3.6 or above, is one of those scholarships. In the case of JulieAnna Little, it did exactly what it is supposed to do — keep a smart high school graduate within the state.
Little, a freshman pre-journalism major from Sisters, said she had considered some universities in Southern California, but ultimately, the University’s reputable School of Journalism and Communication, in addition to the proximity and affordability of the University, swayed her to apply.
“I wanted to be close to home and it’s cheaper to go here,” she said.
The University is not the only institution in the state that has seen more students across its campus. Enrollment is up at almost all Oregon University System institutions, including Oregon State University, where officials are expecting a student body of about 17,000, the largest that school has seen in almost 20 years.
“This will be our fourth year in which our enrollment has gone up,” said Andrew Hashimoto, OSU’s vice provost for academic affairs. “We’ve put in a lot of effort in both recruiting and retention of students.”
OSU’s enrollment had plummeted to a 30-year-low of 13,784 just four years ago.
Hashimoto said he credits the rise in enrollment to improved orientation programs, recruiting and retention.
The increase in enrollment at institutions across the state came as no surprise to Oregon University System spokesman Bob Bruce.
“We had anticipated that there would be an increase in enrollment this fall,” he said. “Most Oregon universities have been [making] good recruiting and retainment efforts.”

He also said that one of the reasons universities in the state are enrolling more students is that more high school graduates and their families are placing a greater value on higher education.
But while university officials across Oregon seem to welcome more students with excitement about the growth of their respective institutions, some are looking at the growth with skepticism and concerns about the quality of education.
While the number of students at the University has risen, the number of faculty members has remained virtually unchanged.
At OSU, additional classes were added to the original curriculum to accommodate the rising number of students, Hashimoto said. However, he said that the institution won’t receive additional funds until next year.
“The funds follow the students,” he said, adding that he’s not convinced that the rise in enrollment comes at the cost of quality of education.
He said most faculty members are aware of the importance enrollment numbers play in university funding and many restructure their lectures to accommodate more students in bigger classrooms.
Buch said he doesn’t think that an increase in the number of students pursuing a higher education means the quality of education or the value of a degree has to suffer. He said a higher education has simply become more important in succeeding in today’s workforce, and students are merely trying to set themselves up for success.
“I think the folks who are concerned about that should take a look at what labor-workforce demands are,” he said. “I don’t believe we are going to have a situation where we are going to have too many educated people.”
Karen Sprague, vice provost for undergraduate affairs, said as long as the number of faculty members increases as student enrollment reaches new heights, the quality of a higher education does not necessarily have to degenerate.
Sprague said that while earning a degree continues to require students to work hard, she doesn’t think that the rising number of degrees awarded has to come at the cost of degrees losing their value.
“I don’t think it matters how many people complete that work,” she said. “But you can’t just keep making classes bigger and bigger and bigger.”
Jonna Lynn Mehrens, an undecided sophomore thinking about majoring in sociology, said bigger classes and an increase in the number of students do not concern her.
“I kind of like bigger classes,” she said.
Mehrens said when the time to make a decision about where to go to college rolled around, she didn’t have to think very hard when she sent her application to the University.
“It was the only place I applied,” she said.
The Portland native said she had only heard good things about the University from her older sister and had always planned on pursuing a higher education at the University.