Daniel Mark Fogel
CREATING A CLASS
With the opening of the fall semester, we welcomed 2,619 first-time first-year undergraduate students to the University of Vermont. By many measures, we are extremely proud of this incoming class. They are one of the most academically talented classes in University history, and they continue a significant upward trend in our ALANA student population. University-wide, 1,132 ALANA students enrolled this fall, an 18 percent increase over last year. That gain is, in large part, due to a more than 50 percent increase in first-time, first-year ALANA students, making the Class of 2013 the most diverse in UVM history.
Our total enrollment numbers also remain strong. Including undergraduate, graduate, medical, and non-degree students, there are 13,391 students enrolled at UVM for the fall semester, marking the fifth consecutive year that we have achieved record-breaking numbers.
We recently received more national media recognition of the University of Vermont’s continuing advance when U.S. News & World Report ranked the University eighth in the magazine’s list of Top Up-and-Coming national universities, institutions heralded for “striking improvements or innovations—schools everyone should be watching.”
While we celebrate these achievements, we are also keenly aware of the old adage that “nothing wilts faster than laurels when sat upon.” Our enrollment gains are hard fought. And well before we enrolled this year’s class, we had already set out on the challenge of bringing in the next as our admissions staff works to build another diverse, high-quality applicant pool. These are highly competitive times in higher education, particularly in the Northeast as high school graduating classes decline in number. The competitive environment will only grow with intensifying price sensitivity to the costs of higher education as families absorb the consequences and lessons of the recession. Our peer institutions are in the same place—pushing hard to communicate their strength and their value in the annual effort to find those students who are the right fit for an institution.
As we build our future classes, new initiatives in growing our international student population promise to make UVM a stronger institution for preparing students to live and work in a global society. Another essential aspect of creating a diverse community is not only enrolling students from different races and ethnicities from across the United States, but also enrolling students from different cultures around the world.
Within the United States, we continue to elevate UVM’s profile with prospective students beyond our traditional areas of strength in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic.
As we step up our admissions efforts on a number of fronts, there can be no greater advocates for the University of Vermont than our graduates. It is one thing to speak with an admissions counselor or read a brochure about UVM; it is an entirely different matter to learn about the University directly from someone who has spent four years on this campus and earned a degree.
There are many ways that our alumni and parents can help spread the good word about UVM, whether it is through a structured effort or an informal one—talking to a high school guidance counselor at your local school, encouraging a friend or relative’s child to look at UVM, or sharing some of the current news of the University that you’ll find in this issue of Vermont Quarterly. Staff in our admissions and development/alumni relations offices are working to create more opportunities for alumni to get involved with student recruitment. Look for details in VQ and other communications as these efforts come together.
As alumni and parents join in the effort to build a strong Class of 2014, you are not only contributing to the academic excellence and diversity of that one class—you are also helping to raise the fine reputation of your alma mater another notch higher. As always, my thanks to our alumni, parents, and friends for the many roles you play in advancing the University of Vermont.
photo by Sally McCay
