APPLETON, WIS. — Of the 399 new students Lawrence University officials will welcome Wednesday, Sept. 13 for move-in day and the beginning of six days of orientation, Chris Dorn easily holds the distinction of starting his college search the earliest…whether he realized it or not.
Dorn, a freshman from Arlington Heights, Ill., made his first visit to the Lawrence campus in June, 1987 — in utero! Dorn’s mother, Karen, was pregnant with Chris when she came to campus to attend her sister’s graduation from Lawrence.
“We’re considering the possibility of starting a bus-in program for pregnant mothers to see if early imprinting really does work,” said Director of Admissions Ken Anselment, tongue firmly planted in cheek.
Dorn is one of 374 incoming freshmen and 25 transfer students who help make this year’s class of new students distinctive for another reason as well. Collectively, they are Lawrence’s inaugural class of first-year students who had the option of not submitting their ACT or SAT scores as part of their application for admission.
In February, 2005, Lawrence announced it would become test optional beginning with students matriculating in the fall of 2006. At the time, Lawrence was one of less than 20 liberal arts colleges nationally to forgo standardized test scores as a requirement for admission. It remains the only liberal arts college in Wisconsin to do so.
In the 18 months since Lawrence elected to become test-optional, at least 10 other institutions have followed suit. Of the 215 colleges that U.S. News & World Report ranks in its annual “Best Colleges” national liberal arts colleges category, Lawrence and 12 others of the top quarter of those institutions, among them Bates, Bowdoin and Hamilton, have made the SAT and ACT optional in their admission process.
“We felt the system had gotten out of whack,” Steve Syverson, dean of admissions at Lawrence University, said in a recent New York Times article. “Back when kids just got a good night’s sleep and took the SAT, it was a leveler that helped you find the diamond in the rough. Now that most of the great scores are affluent kids with lots of preparation, it just increases the gap between the haves and the have-nots.”
While students still have the option of submitting SAT or ACT scores, Syverson says Lawrence prefers to rely on its time-tested standard of “multiple intelligences” when reviewing a student’s application for admission.
Anselment credits the decision to go test optional as one of several reasons Lawrence enjoyed a 12 percent surge in freshman applications this year en route to a school record 2,315, shattering the previous all-time high of 2,060 established last year.
“Our applicant pool has been steadily rising over the last few years,” said Anselment. “More importantly, our rate of growth of applicants has been pretty remarkable. In addition to outpacing most of our direct peer institutions such as Grinnell, Beloit and Knox, we’ve been outpacing the national rate of growth as well.
“Certainly going test optional had something to do with the big bump this year,” Anselment said. “But so, too, did some other factors, such as our inclusion in the book ‘Colleges That Change Lives’ and the success of our athletic teams.”
According to Anselment, about one-quarter of this year’s record-number of freshman applicants chose not to submit test scores, a figure he said was very close to what college officials had expected to see.
“We’re discovering that students are genuinely elated by the fact that Lawrence recognizes there is more to them that just a standardized test score,” said Anselment. “When we talk to students these days and explain that option, they light up.”
As a result of the uptick in applications, Lawrence admit rate dipped to 56 percent of the students who applied this year, a 12-point improvement in its selectivity from 2005.
“We were shooting for a freshman class of between 370 and 375 and wound up with 374, so we’re pretty happy,” said Anselment. “We’re right on target in terms of holding our overall enrollment to 1,400.”
This year’s 399 new students hail from 33 states and 17 countries, representing 294 different high schools. Ashwaubenon High School holds the distinction of producing the most members of this year’s incoming class with six, while Appleton East High School and South High School in Minneapolis, each sent five new students to Lawrence this fall.
Wisconsin accounted for 37 percent (140) of the new students, with Illinois and Minnesota responsible for 14 percent and nine percent, respectively. Among international students, South Korea accounted for the most with five, followed by China (4), Canada and Japan (3 each) and Vietnam and Jamaica with two apiece.
The academic profile of the new students maintains Lawrence’s long-standing tradition of attracting top-notch students. Among those students who did include test results with their application, the average ACT score was just over 28, a slight increase from last year. Composite grade points averaged 3.45 unweighted on a 4.0 scale and 66 percent of the incoming freshman ranked in the top quarter of their graduating class. Ninety-three percent of the first-year students were awarded need-based or merit-based financial assistance, with aid awards averaging $23,300.
“Students are excited about our decision to go test-optional, particularly those with really strong grades whose test scores are not good indicators of their academic performance,” Anselment said. “We continue to attract the best and the brightest students by any measure — test scores, grade point averages, leadership skills, artistic talents, community engagement. We’re excited that more of them than ever are interested in attending Lawrence.”
Classes for Lawrence’s 157th academic year begin Wednesday, Sept. 20.
