Spectrum - Volume 19 Issue 01 August 29, 1996 - Freshman class profiled

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A non-profit publication of the Office of the University Relations of Virginia Tech,
including The Conductor , a special section of the Spectrum printed 4 times a year

Freshman class profiled

By Netta S. Smith

Spectrum Volume 19 Issue 01 - August 29, 1996

The university has welcomed 5,100 freshmen to campus this fall. This record number of students was selected out of 16,500 applications processed. In addition, 1,016 transfer students enrolled.

Males make up 49 percent of the new freshman class, which represents 1,292 high schools.

Fifteen percent of the incoming freshmen were enrolled under the Early Admission plan. More than 500 are eligible for the Honors Program, and nearly 200 are African-American.

More than 10 percent of the class are legacies; that means that the mother, father, or a grandparent of these 522 freshmen attended Virginia Tech.

Virginia Tech houses about 8,400 students in campus residence halls, making it one of the largest such operations in the country. However, all other students-more than 16,000-live off campus.

More than 300 freshmen are participating in the Corps of Cadets, and implementing programs designed to attract and retain students in the corps. New corps scholarships and a new leadership-training program helped make the university attractive to many of these students.

The average SAT score of the incoming class members is 1,147, and the average high-school GPA is 3.4. Eighty percent scored 500 or above in the SAT verbal test and 90 percent scored 500 or above on the SAT math test.

Ninety-seven percent of the freshmen were in the top 50 percent of their high-school class, with 28 percent in the top 10 percent. One-hundred-forty-eight of the freshmen were valedictorians or salutatorians for their high schools.

The class of 2000 comes from 31 nations and from 45 states and territories, including Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Virginia provided the largest percentage of the class, with 68 percent. Outside of Virginia, Maryland provided the greatest number of students, 390. It was followed by Pennsylvania, 272; New Jersey, 216; West Virginia, 128; and New York, 114. New international students account for 122 of freshmen and transfers.

Engineering is the most popular major for incoming freshmen, followed by university studies, biology, business, computer science, animal and poultry science, communications, psychology, architecture, and accounting.