Ohio State University officials have a lot to boast about when it comes to the incoming freshman class. Average ACT and SAT scores increased. The number of students in the top 10 and 25 percent of their high school class also increased. And more people applied to OSU this year. But those were not the only increases.
Sixty-one hundred freshman will start classes at OSU next week. And almost a fourth of them will be the first in their family to go to college.
Mabel Freeman is OSU's assistant vice president for undergraduate admissions. Freeman said while the numbers continue to rise there is still a lot of work to be done to get students like them in college.
"We know in Ohio we have a lot of work to do. We have a lot of fine students who are clearly capable of going to college who think they can't either because they're not getting the encouragement from home or they think they can't afford to go. The reality is they can't afford not to go," Freeman said.
Another increase is the number of minorities coming to Ohio State and staying for a second year - specially the number of African American men. Georgina Dodge is Assistant Vice Provost for Minority Affairs at OSU. Dodge is pleased with the increases, but said they're slow going.
"It's going to take some very critical intervention because as we know the prison populations far outnumber the college populations when it comes to African American males," Dodge said.
But Dodge said OSU is doing everything it can to attract and retain its African American male students as well as other students of color. She said there are different programs that help minorities feel more at home.
"A huge factor of retention is climate. How they feel in an environment. And I think that's true of all of us in any situation. If we're uncomfortable then we don't want to be here," Dodge said.
Sixteen percent of this year's incoming freshmen are minorities.