Madison Reporter

Even with a new freshmen class of over 8,600 students, the University of Wisconsin Madison has a familiar look to it this fall semester.

School officials report nearly 800 of the new freshmen students are from Wisconsin families who qualify for Bucky’s Promise, a program that covers tuition for Wisconsin students whose families make less than 60,000 a year, providing them with four years of tuition free schooling.

This year’s freshman class is the largest in the university’s history, up 1.9% from last year, though the university actually admitted 3,000 fewer students than last year, but a much higher percentage of those admitted chose to come to UW Madison. Overall, there were more than 60,000 students applying for admittance to the school this academic year.

The ongoing surge in the number of students admitted to the school comes just seven years after school officials committed to enrolling at least 3,600 Wisconsin natives as part of each freshmen class. This year’s haul of just fewer than 3,800 local freshmen students comes despite a recent overall drop in the number of high school graduates in the state. School officials also note the class is the most racially and ethnically diverse class in university history.

More and more, people are taking notice.

“One of the things that has most impressed me about UW–Madison is its commitment to affordability and accessibility, especially for our home state students,” says Chancellor Jennifer Mnookin, who began at the school in late summer. “These are core priorities for me, so I look forward to working with the campus community to maintain crucial initiatives like Bucky’s Tuition Promise and to expand on them wherever we can.”

Overall, 932 students on campus this semester are receiving Bucky’s Tuition Promise, with 794 of them being freshmen and the other 138 transfer students. The freshman class also includes 1,404 students receiving need-based financial assistance through the Federal Pell Grant program. That number represents the highest number of Pell Grant recipients in a freshmen class on record.

On the diversity front, data also shows there are 1,431 underrepresented students of color, up from 1,251 last year. These students now comprise 16.6% of the freshman class, up from 14.8% last year, and representing the highest number and percentage of underrepresented students of color on record. In addition, roughly one in five of all the new freshmen and transfer students identify as first-generation students, defined as neither parent having a four-year college degree.