Influx of students

Perhaps in a not-so-surprising fashion, Wilfrid Laurier University’s Waterloo campus has increased its first-year enrollment by about three per cent, jumping to a number of 3,994 from 3,380 from last year. With the Brantford campus included, that number will be 4,700.

These numbers, however, are subject to change because this year’s tally is only reflective of those students who accepted Laurier’s offer, not those who actually come to the university. A set number will be determined after an evaluation on Nov. 1.

“There’s always a little flux in the numbers this time of year, so we didn’t typically speak in a level of precision. That will come with an official count on Nov. 1,” explained Tom Buckley, the assistant vice president of academic services at Laurier.

According to Holly Cox, director of recruitment and admissions at WLU, this is the largest intake of first year students the university has seen so far.

While this is the most ever, it was Laurier’s target.

“This is very close to where our target was, this isn’t off-base at all,” she added.

She also noted that there were a number of students who were transferring to Laurier from another university or college.

“We do have new students who are transfer students from another university or a college that have an advance standing like year two,” explained Cox. “This year in Waterloo we have 68 and in Brantford we have 94. “

Both Cox and Buckley mentioned that the higher numbers are somewhat a result of their new targets for non-traditional and international students.

“For example, on the Brantford campus there should be a 1,000 new faces this fall, about 850 undergrads and about 150 international students in Brantford,” said Buckley.

“And that is a significant increase over the last three years. On the Waterloo campus as well we’ve got our largest our Orientation this year. It’s definitely, I’d say, the most diverse entering class in Laurier’s history,” he continued.

Ontario Universities’ Application Centre has announced that the total number of first-year university admissions rose by 2.4 per cent to 70,788 from 69,132 last year.