More Vermonters are enrolled in UVM’s first-year class this fall

More Vermonters are enrolled in the University of Vermont’s incoming first-year class this year, bucking — for the second year in a row — a slow decline in in-state enrollment.

UVM administrators said the incoming class of 2028 is projected to include about 2,840 students, with nearly 20% expected to hail from the state of Vermont. That represents approximately a 5.5 percent increase in the number of Vermonters compared to the incoming class of 2027, according to UVM spokesperson Basil Waugh.

Those figures are still preliminary, and finalized data will not be available until after the university’s annual student census in September, he said.

“Our commitment to Vermonters helps fulfill our public land-grant mission here in our state, while broadening our appeal beyond the borders of Vermont makes us a global destination for higher education,” UVM President Suresh Garimella said in a Monday press release. (Garimella was recently hired to be the president of the University of Arizona, and will leave UVM in October. Provost Patricia Prelock will step in as the interim leader.)

As Vermont’s population ages, the state has produced fewer and fewer high school graduates. That’s left the state’s colleges and universities with a dwindling pool of potential in-state students to draw from.

As the number of students has declined, multiple Vermont colleges have shuttered in the past decade. Just this spring, Goddard College, the 86-year-old Plainfield institution, announced that it would close at the end of the semester.

UVM has responded to the shrinking population of Vermont high school grads in part by looking beyond its own borders. According to the university, the class of 2028 is drawn from 47 states and 28 countries, and half of the class comes from outside New England.

In fact, UVM’s percentage of new in-state first-years has been unusually low compared to other large public universities. As of 2021, according to federal data, only 18% of new first-years at UVM hailed from Vermont — a smaller percentage than most large public institutions. Most large public universities for which data was available that year enrolled first-year classes that were over 50% in-state students.

But that increasing reliance on out-of-state students has fueled discussions about the land-grant university’s role within Vermont, and its responsibility to the state and its students.

Administrators maintain that they are committed to serving Vermonters, and that UVM’s ability to attract students from all over the country brings much-needed young residents into the state, many of whom stay in Vermont after graduating.

This year’s slight uptick in in-state students is a product of the university’s efforts to woo Vermont applicants, administrators said. UVM recruiters have visited high schools throughout the state, and “nearly 85 percent of college-bound Vermont high school seniors applied to UVM,” Vice Provost for Enrollment Management Jay Jacobs said in this week’s press release.

“In-state enrollment continues to climb, and affordability is a clear driver for that,” Jacobs said, noting that the university financial aid programs allow more than 150 Vermont students to attend without paying tuition and fees.

Last fall, first-year in-state enrollment also rose from the previous year, by about 10%.

The acceptance rate for out-of-state students for this year’s incoming first-year class was 64%, and the acceptance rate for in-state students was 74%, according to Waugh, the spokesperson.

The first-year class has a weighted GPA of 4.0, according to Waugh, and will include approximately 11% first-generation students and 15% BIPOC students.

UVM received about 30,000 undergraduate applications, roughly the same number as last year. Applications for graduate programs increased by 14%, according to the university, and applications for the medical school increased by 6%.

Read the story on VTDigger here: More Vermonters are enrolled in UVM’s first-year class this fall .