Despite economic downturn and the rising cost of admission, Syracuse University received 21,000 applications this year – the second highest in school history – and they’re coming in from all over the world. ‘The economic climate was such this year that we had a lot of concerns. We were really worried about the possibility of fewer applications but that just didn’t happen,’ said Susan Donovan, dean of admissions.This week SU welcomes 3,279 first-year students and 276 transfer students to campus. It’s one of the most geographically and ethnically diverse groups to date. The percentage of minorities enrolled at SU is 31 percent of freshmen or 1,009 students – up from 29 percent last year. The number of minority transfer students increased from last year by three percent. ‘One of the significant strides that we made was in under-represented students,’ Donovan said. ‘It’s so important and we’re pleased to see that it keeps going up every year.’Though the numbers continue to grow, College Prowler gave Syracuse a C grade for Diversity in their annual report, suggesting there’s still work to be done. SU came in at No. 8 this year in the category ‘Little Race/Class Interaction,’ far from its 2001 ranking of No. 1 for ‘Best Race Relations,’ according to the Princeton Review’s annual reports. Geographic diversity is also up this year, a result of increased international recruitment.Donovan’s staff traveled internationally and to 42 U.S. cities year round for career fairs and interviews. They’ve added more student interviews, and visited more U.S. cities and countries than in the past. The office will continue to expand their travel plans, adding trips to South and Central America and the Middle East in October, Donovan said.International students make up 5.1 percent of all first year students, with 167 students enrolled. The largest increase came in students from China. This year SU welcomes 62 students – 37 percent of all international students.’This is happening really throughout the United States,’ Donovan said. ‘Now that China is open they’re sending a lot of their students overseas.’The number of Puerto Rican students also increased to 47 this year, the highest number to date. According to Donovan, this figure exceeds the number of students from most Midwestern and Southern U.S. states in this year’s freshman class. ‘I think we are looking more and more individually at applicants,’ Donovan said. ‘The personal interview is a way for people on the admissions committee to get to know somebody beyond the electronic application they send us. It gives us an insight into a student’s maturity and their seriousness about their work. It helps us understand what their view is of giving back to others.’While the number of students from overseas has increased, the percentage from New York State and neighboring states is also going up.The number of students from the northeast increased to 75 percent of all first years – up five percent from last year. The number of freshmen from New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, Connecticut and Maryland were especially high. Donovan suspects this trend also reflects the economy – students don’t want to travel too far from home.The percentage of transfer students remained steady, though more are coming from two-year colleges, Donovan said. Sixty-four percent of students either come from a public high school or a community college, she said.’Students decide they’ll go somewhere for a couple of years and keep the cost down, and then transfer to the more expensive private university,’ she said. With more countries and states represented, Donovan considers this year’s class profile a step in the right direction.’We’re always trying to diversify the class so that it’s interesting for students who are here. So they can say, ‘Well, in my writing class I had friends from all over the world, and I met people from Alabama and people from Singapore and people from Washington state.”

jmterrus@syr.edu