After a change in the University’s admissions policy in 2018, LSU reported an increased incoming freshman population but a slightly lower retention rate.
The new holistic admissions system, approved in October 2018, evaluates applicants’ criteria beyond ACT or SAT scores. The system looks at curriculum, grade trends and course selections all within the context of applicants’ high schools.
Students are still expected to meet GPA and test score requirements to apply to the University, but the new admissions system considers other criteria beyond these numbers.
Reports by the University boast an increase in attendance following the admissions change, but a .7% decrease in retention rate. According to the U.S. Department of Education, the retention rate of a university is the percentage of a school’s first-year undergraduate students who continue their education at the school the next year.
Just over 5,800 new freshmen enrolled in fall 2018, according to an LSU Office of Budget and Planning report. Of that number, 4,824 returned in fall 2019, making the 2018-2019 retention rate 83%.
The 2018-2019 retention rate is .7% lower than that of the fall 2017 freshman class, but .2% higher than that of the fall 2016 freshman class, according to reports by the LSU Office of Budget and Planning.
The same report stated 6,126 new freshmen enrolled in fall 2019. The mean ACT score for these students was 25.6.
The fall 2018 freshmen enrollment was the highest enrollment in University history, topping the previous record of 5,725 new freshmen in 2012, according to the LSU Media Center.
“LSU increased its freshman class size without sacrificing quality or academic rigor,” the April 2019 report read.
The report also said the fall 2018 freshman class had a 2.8 college GPA, equal to that of the 2017 freshman class GPA. The 2018 freshman class also earned more credits in the first semester than the previous two incoming classes, and there was an improvement in the retention levels of the fall semester to the spring semester.
The fall 2018 freshman class had a 94% fall-to-spring retention rate, according to the report, equal to the previous freshman class’ retention rate despite having 900 more students enrolled.
“This is the way the country is growing,” then-University President F. King Alexander said in the report. “This diverse class of students is succeeding in ways that a lot of people said they couldn’t succeed in, and we are proud of the hard work they have put in to prove those people wrong.”
During the admission policy change, then-SG President Stewart Lockett said SG supported holistic admissions.
“Student Government supports holistic admissions because it gives opportunities to students who, in certain situations, wouldn’t have those opportunities,” Lockett said. “It doesn’t define a student to a piece of paper or test score. It makes them real.”
The change in admissions was met with some confusion and doubt, which Alexander addressed in an editorial for The Advocate in 2018. He said that though change is sometimes hard to accept, it can be necessary.
“In short, holistic review doesn’t lessen our admission standards,” Alexander wrote. “It actually increases the level of scrutiny a potential student receives by introducing more than two data points into their evaluation.”
The LSU Board of Supervisors unanimously passed a resolution supporting comprehensive admissions in October 2018. The resolution said this new admission process is in practice at 40 out of the 50 flagship universities across the nation.
“The Board acknowledges research has shown grade point average and ACT or SAT scores alone do not provide the fullest, most accurate picture of a student’s potential success,” the 2018 resolution read.
Even with support from the Board of Supervisors, the change in admissions was met with some criticism, most notably from former Board of Regents hair and University alumnus Richard Lispey.
“[Holistic admissions] will not be good for the vast majority of hardworking students and parents who have been competing and succeeding with defined rules,” Lipsey said. “They now will be subjected to having their educational futures determined by arbitrary decisions of an admissions bureaucracy that can be influenced by politics and cronyism.”
On Feb. 19, the Louisiana Board of Regents voted to increase the minimum admissions standards for public universities after weeks of behind-the-scenes meetings.
The changes include financial penalties for campuses that don’t follow the requirements. Once a school has breached the policy for two consecutive years, it may suffer reduced funding if the board votes in favor.
“Today’s policy improvements retain the Regents’ steadfast commitment to have students admitted where they can be most successful,” Commissioner of Higher Education Kim Hunter Reed said in a statement.
The standards and the percentage of allowed exceptions vary depending on the school, with the University’s flagship campus having the toughest admissions requirements.
Incoming freshmen must now have a 3.0 GPA or a 25 ACT score, with up to 4% of the class allowed exceptions.