CORRECTION APPENDED SEE BOTTOMThe University accepted 40 percent of its first-year applicants for the Class of 2013, an 8-percent increase over its 32-percent acceptance rate for the Class of 2012, while facing a 13-percent decline in the number of applications, Senior Vice President for Students and Enrollment Jean Eddy said at last Thursday's faculty meeting.

The University is aiming for a Class of 2013 of 825, Dean of Admissions Gil Villanueva said in an interview. Eddy explained at the meeting that the University has increased its target enrollment by 75 students to make up for enrollment shortfalls this past year.

Brandeis received 6,687 applications this year, down from 7,724 last year, Eddy said. Eddy attributed the decline in applications to the financial crisis, referring to other smaller liberal arts institutions with smaller endowments that have faced declines ranging from 2 to 20 percent. At the same time, Eddy said that there has been an increase in the number of applications at public universities and at universities with larger endowments, as they are able to offer generous financial aid.

Eddy said she expected applications to achieve previous years' acceptance levels again once the economy recovers. "I think students [this year] are going to look for where they think they can have their best opportunity to be at a price that the family feels is affordable to them," she said. According to Villaneuva, "Given the economic uncertainties and press coverage of Brandeis, our ability to yield our class is somewhat unpredictable."

"Admitted Students Day is the single biggest yield activity that we have," Eddy said, adding that more than 1,300 students and their families have registered for today's Accepted Student's Day. About two-thirds of students who come usually decide to enroll, she said.

Villanueva said that he did not believe the admission rate would factor into university rankings because an institution's reputation is also taken into consideration.

Eddy said at the meeting that the University had decreased its offers of merit aid and focused instead on offering need-based aid. Villanueva explained that this decision was made after perceiving an increased need by students and families.

Eddy said that the academic quality of the applicant pool and the accepted students in general has improved in terms of SAT scores and other indicators.

University offices had fielded many questions about Brandeis' financial health from prospective students, Villanueva said. "We have been very, very clear: [The University is] not going anywhere," he said. With regard to concerns about the closing of the Rose Art Museum, he said that Admissions staff explained to prospective students that the proposal was made in order to "[conserve] the integrity of academic enterprise here at Brandeis" and that the possible addition of teaching space would benefit students.

The New York Times reported March 31 that Brandeis has accepted 10 percent more international students and that the University also expected to accept more wait-listed students and transfer students, none of whom are admitted on a need-blind basis.

Eddy said that the increase in international students was a result of a new initiative called the Gateway program, which aims to recruit an additional 10 or 20 international students compared to previous years. This program offers admission to students with scores on the Test of English as a Foreign Language exam that Brandeis considers borderline with the requirement that they complete a special English class over the summer prior to their first semester.

She also reported that applications had been down in all states except for California and a slight increase in Massachusetts. Eddy explained that the increase in California occurred partially as a result of the University creating an associate director of admissions position in San Diego in order to take better advantage of recruiting opportunities in the area. The director visits college fairs and high schools in California as part of a program under which the University hopes to expand its recruiting efforts to other parts of the country.

Another recent recruiting initiative by Admissions to recruit the class of 2013 by asking the top 500 applicants whether they would like a faculty member to get in touch with them was met with less success than expected. "We decided it was ridiculous to ask students if they wanted someone to reach out and touch them" and chose to contact all students, Eddy said. The success of that program manifested itself in the number of registrations for Open House, she said.

Villaneuva explained that faculty and about 250 current students recruited by the Student Union were each contacting 1,200 students by phone, e-mail or letter. Alumni and University President Jehuda Reinharz have also contacted students. In addition to the individualized contact , Admissions has also been sending out hard-copy letters from department chairs for 3 years, he added.


The success of that program manifested itself in the number of registrations for Spring Open House, Eddy said.

James Simpkins, an accepted student from Rochester, N.Y. said he recalled receiving a hard-copy letter from the chair of the Philosophy department. "It made me pause for a second and say, 'Oh, that's cool, Brandeis took the time to really recruit me, and none of my other colleges have actually done that.'"

Simpkins said that ultimately financial concerns determined his final decision. "I received a large scholarship, $25,000 a year from Brandeis, but beyond that I didn't get very much grant aid, and I got pretty big loans." He eventually enrolled at the University of Pittsburgh, with a full scholarship. "I felt sort of sad that I didn't get enough money to really give [Brandeis] a true consideration."

Faculty contact was a determining factor in college choice for Kim Bouchard-Chaimowiz '13 from Boca Raton, Fla., who received an e-mail from an Anthropology professor.

"None of the other institutions I've been accepted to have done anything like it," she wrote in an e-mail to the Justice. "It was really the letters that confirmed to me that Brandeis was the place I wanted to be." She wrote that she had received sufficient aid for Brandeis to be very affordable to her. "I responded to the e-mail and got a response back right away. It was pretty cool to look up a professors' work and see how much he has contributed to the field and know . that he was just an e-mail away, and I don't even have him for class yet," Bouchard-Chaimowiz wrote.

Correction: The original article paraphrased a quote attributed to Dean of Admissions Gil Villanueva incorrectly. Faculty and students recruited by the Student Union were contacting 1,200 prospective students, not 250.

The original article also incorrectly identified the timing of the University's hiring of an associate director of admissions in San Diego. The position was filled before this year's admissions cycle, not after it.