The University has exceeded its target for the incoming first-year class size by 45 students and is undertaking new approaches in order to increase enrollment for next year, said Senior Vice President for Students and Enrollment Jean Eddy at a faculty meeting last Thursday.The University plans on increasing its enrollment by 400 undergraduates over the next five years as one way to increase revenue, according to the recommendations by the the Curriculum and Academic Restructuring Steering committee. Since former Dean of Admissions Gil Villanueva left Brandeis in July for the University of Richmond, Eddy told the Justice that she has been acting as interim Admissions dean to ensure a "steady state" in the Admissions office. She added that the search for a dean of Admissions usually takes place in February and that she aims to bring a search firm to campus in January with the hope of choosing a new dean by July 1.

At the meeting, Eddy said that the Admissions office had the goal to recruit 800 freshmen, 50 transfers and 120 midyears for the Class of 2013. "We conducted our own admitted student questionnaire this summer. We used a research firm who called accepted students. From that survey, two factors for not enrolling emerged-bad press and lack of merit aid," Eddy wrote.

However, the University brought 845 students in the fall. Of that number, 788 are traditional fall admits, 20 are part of the restructured Transitional Year Program and 40 participated in the new Gateway program. In addition, 55 transfer students entered in the fall, she said.

The new TYP program had students who meet certain requirements automatically enroll in their sophomore year. The Gateway program is geared toward students whose scores on the Test Of English as a Foreign Language were below the number required for admission.

While applications went down by 12 percent this year, the University emphasized diversity in recruiting the Class of 2013, Eddy said at the meeting.

Nearly a quarter of the incoming class, 24 percent of students, identify as students of color, up from 20 percent the previous year, Eddy said. Of those students, 6 percent identify as African American, 14 percent as Asian, 5 percent as Latino and 1 percent as Native American with mixed-race students making up the remaining percentage.

The admission rate was 40 percent, up from 32 percent last year. Eddy wrote that she thought the fall entrance was larger because fewer students were admitted from waiting lists at other schools and that the midyear class was smaller because students received large financial aid packages from other institutions so that "the pressure was too great to wait for Brandeis in January."

Of the admitted students, 29 percent applied to Brandeis early- decision.

"If that number becomes higher, that would certainly help us going forward," Eddy said.

In a year when the average SAT score declined nationally, the Brandeis average dipped from 1360 to 1355, Eddy said at the meeting.

With 87 midyears expected, the University is still working on maximizing the number of students entering in January, she explained, because midyears go to other institutions or take jobs before coming to Brandeis. "We don't know what will happen going forward with that number," she said.

"There will be some students who decide to stay where they are. That number [of midyears] was supposed to be 120, but because we brought in 845 freshmen in the fall, we are well-positioned to still make the goal in January," Eddy said.

Eddy said that the University would institute January admissions this year for transfer students, another way to ensure the University meets the larger student enrollment goals set by the CARS committee.

The Admissions office is focusing on new ways to encourage students to apply, particularly by reaching out to high school admissions counselors. New students direct about 53,000 inquiries to Brandeis a year of whom about 7,000 people apply, she said.

To increase applications, the University is working on hosting breakfasts with guidance counselors in eight regions with high potential, such as Chicago, Seattle and New Jersey, she said. She emphasized that guidance counselors helped students draft their shortlists of colleges.

"What we need to do is to really wow the guidance community so that when they go back they [direct] their students to Brandeis," she said.

"To do that, we bring somebody from the Admissions office, but we need faculty there. We need somebody who can talk about Brandeis and have them see Brandeis the way our students will see Brandeis," she said at the meeting.

In an e-mail to the Justice, Eddy wrote that the Admissions office consulted faculty in prioritizing goals for this past year. "Goals are always dependent on the number of applications received, so when applications are down it is important to ask what goals are the most important," she wrote.

"For me, for the existing students and for the faculty, making sure that we have a richly diverse population on campus is the most important goal."

She said she had already been in contact with faculty who have volunteered to make visits in order to help recruit more students.

Prof. Stephen Dowden (GRALL) is one such faculty member who will be travelling to his home state of Texas to talk to prospective students about Brandeis.

"Texas is important because the population of college-age kids is growing rapidly, much more so than here, and it is already a very populous state in any case. We'd like to see students from all over the country in Brandeis. They need to know about us!" Dowden wrote in an e-mail to the Justice.

Eddy added that the same company that surveyed admitted students found that the informational sheets on Brandeis majors were "not doing the best job telling students how great our majors are."

She wrote that "We hope to emphasize the quality of our majors in a more dramatic way.