Samford announces record enrollment

Samford announces record enrollment

Samford University had a record enrollment for the fall 2009 semester, with 4,658 students.

This year’s total exceeds the previous record of 4,630 set in 1995 and includes nearly 200 more students than the final total for fall 2008. The 2009 figures comprise 2,908 undergraduates and a record 1,750 graduate students.

One reason for the high total is the presence of about 850 new students, most of whom are freshmen, according to R. Phil Kimrey, Samford’s vice president for student affairs and enrollment management. With other new students in graduate and professional programs, this total exceeds 1,100, he added.

“This unusually large number of first-year students affirms the strong efforts of our faculty and staff in helping with the recruiting process last spring and through the summer,” Kimrey said. “We had a record number of first-year students participating in orientation and welcome activities.”

Kimrey also noted the academic strength of this year’s freshman class, with an average ACT score of 26, significantly higher than the national average of 21. About one-fourth of the class ranked in the top 10 percent of its high school graduating class. Fifteen members of the class were National Merit Scholarship finalists.

Kimrey especially noted that both undergraduate and graduate programs in nursing saw significant enrollment increases. The large increases represent increased national interest in health care education and aggressive recruitment efforts by the faculty and staff of Samford’s Ida V. Moffett School of Nursing, he said. Samford’s pharmacy and law schools also had increased enrollments.

President Andrew Westmoreland said he is especially pleased the university was able to reach a record enrollment, given the current global economic climate.

“Our faculty, staff, alumni and current students did an extraordinary job over the last year of cultivating and recruiting students for Samford,” Westmoreland said. “And those efforts obviously paid dividends. We stressed Samford’s strong academic reputation and affordability, things that are very important to prospective students and their parents.”

The majority of students come from Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee and Florida, and the number of entering freshmen from Alabama was the highest in about a decade. Samford continues to be Alabama’s largest private university and is ranked in the top tier of national doctoral research universities by the U.S. News & World Report collegiate rankings. (SU)