the Cento

With Centre’s Jan. 15 application deadline for prospective students already passed, the Admissions Office plans to again set a target enrollment goal between 340-360 first-year students, an increase from the set target of about 310 students only a couple of years ago. This enrollment target is on par with that of last year, when the College welcomed a record 356 new students.

Bob Nesmith, Dean of Admission and Student Financial Planning, said, “If we hold at this pattern we’ll be at 1260-1280 students next year, and close to 1300 the year after that.”

The increased enrollment target is part of the strategic plan approved by the Board in 2008, which, among other planning endeavors, outlined that there be growth in the student body as the opportunity presented itself. The advent of Young, which provides more classroom and lab space, and of Pearl Hall, which offers more housing, brought just the opportunity Centre needed to begin increasing the student population.

Yet despite some concern that such a large enrollment target will hurt Centre’s tradition as a small, tightly-knit community, the administration is adamant that the anticipated growth will not change the College for the worse.

“We won’t grow at the expense of our student-faculty ratio,” Nesmith said. Instead, growth will allow the College to “get more faculty, deepen some existing programs, begin some new programs that will make for a more academic experience, and will put the College on more sound footing financially.”

With greater growth will also come more ethnic, cultural and geographic diversity, all of which will benefit the Centre community.

“No one’s imagining that we suddenly have part-time faculty, no one’s imagining that we suddenly jump to a 25 student average class size, no one’s imagining that we suddenly become 75% residential,” Nesmith said.

Vice President and Dean of Student Life Randy Hays agreed, saying that “maintaining the feel of Centre and its community is one of the things we’ve remained committed to, and that hasn’t changed.”

The College’s strategic plan outlines ways in which Centre will become more diverse and competitive, and a slightly larger student body is anticipated to allow students more course offerings.

More students will not only put Centre on par with its peers’ enrollments, but it will make the College more attractive to prospective students and “keep us moving forward,” Nesmith said. “The best way to go about that growth was by adding programs that attract more students and that make Centre stronger.” Over the past two years these added programs have included Division III lacrosse programs, the Brown Fellows scholarship and language scholarships.

Of course, a larger student body will mean a higher demand in accommodations such as housing, food and parking. The College hopes to move more students off-campus in the future to compensate for the increase in student population.

“There will be a few more people overseas and a few more off-campus students,” Nesmith said. “We can decrease our percentage from 98 percent to 94-95 percent living on campus and still be a highly residential campus. We’re not going to grow at the expense of our profile. No one will be forced to live off-campus.”

Said Hays, “more people sign up for off-campus housing than we’re able to let go. We allow students to live off campus based on how many beds we need. We’ve never had to not house someone on campus because we haven’t had enough beds.”

The Student Life Office (SLO) will look for ways to add beds on campus as buildings continue to change functions. For example, the attic of Wiseman was renovated into a third floor residence hall over the summer, adding more beds for upperclassmen in response to the housing need.

Regarding other aspects of student life, Hays said that the SLO always tries to have more parking spots than it has students with cars, and does not anticipate this being a problem in the coming years.

Furthermore, new buildings such as the Student Center and Young Hall were built to accommodate more students than are currently enrolled in the College, setting Centre up to succeed even with larger incoming classes.

Another consideration made in the decision to increase student enrollment was the desire to keep the Centre student body competitive with quality first-year students entering campus.

Despite the record-setting enrollment in the current first-year class, students admitted this past year were more competitive than the smaller classes before them. The class of 2014 left high school with an average ACT score of 28.55, and 60 percent graduated in the top 10 percent of their graduating class. “Centre has a rising reputation and is an appealing option to bright students who want a quality experience but not for $50,000 a year” Nesmith said.

Still, despite the surplus of gifted students applying to Centre, growth will remain very gradual. Nesmith said, “Nothing we’re contemplating will hurt the College’s culture of focus being put on individual students.”