More Students Apply, Yet Yield Stays the Same

By Marianys Marte and Hannah Gonzalez

Fordham received a record number of applicants to the undergraduate schools for the class of 2021, but the class’s year remains constant with years prior. This is the 26th consecutive year of application growth. The class of 2021 had an acceptance rate of 46 percent, fairly consistent with the past four years. Fordham’s yield rate has not grown in proportion to the increasing number of accepted students. Instead, it remains around the yield rates of prior years at 11.5 percent, according to Patricia Peek, Ph.D., director of undergraduate admissions.

The class of 2021 saw approximately 260 more applications than the class of 2020, as 45,035 students applied to be undergraduate freshmen at Fordham College Rose Hill, Fordham College Lincoln Center and the Gabelli School of Business.

Approximately five hundred more students were accepted for the class of 2021 than the class of 2020, with 20,772 accepted, according to John Buckley, associate vice president for undergraduate enrollment. The Class of 2020 had a total of 44,768 applicants and 20,214 offers of admissions. Approximately 2,160 full-time undergraduate students enrolled for entry in fall 2016 in FCRH, FCLC and GSB combined.

But the yield rate – or the rate of accepted students who end up attending the university — for the class of 2016 was 12.9 percent, in contrast to the class of 2020’s 11.2 percent in May of last year. This year’s 11.5 percent reflects the continuation of a trend of stable yield rates, despite the growth in acceptances.

Buckley said the past three cycles of applications saw 5.6 percent growth for FCRH, 2.5 percent growth at FCLC and 8 percent growth at GSB at both campuses.

According to Dr. Patricia Peek, director of undergraduate admission, Fordham’s stable yield rate is a result of competition with other institutions.

“With students applying to many more schools via the Common Application and electronic filing, and Fordham competing for some of the very best students against some of the strongest schools in the country, yield is a challenging figure to predict and manage,” she said.

Buckley attributed the growth in enrollment to a variety of causes. He said “the personal attention to students often associated with a small college experience” was a significant factor for many students.

“Sophisticated direct marketing campaigns complemented by myriad campus visit programs… are at the core of reaching prospective students across the country and around the world,” said Buckley.

More than 47,000 students now visit Fordham annually, according to Buckley.
While Class of 2020 was one of the most geographically diverse in the university’s history, those accepted into the Class of 2021 are made up of students from all 50 states, with more than 400 potential students ranging from New York to California, said Buckley.
The acceptance rate remained consistent with those of the past few years, according to Buckley. The last four years saw acceptance rates from 45 to 48 percent.

Slightly more minority students were admitted to Fordham than in years prior, according to Buckley. Asian, black, Hispanic or multiracial students constituted 35 percent of the admitted pool for the class of 2021, slightly above 33 percent for the class of 2020.

Geographical diversity has increased. The Class of 2020 had 192 international students. This year, the university admitted 2,814 international students from more than 100 countries.