The Prospective Student Services Web site now has features that many students may find useful when making the decision on whether or not to come to OU.

Virtual campus tours that show every place on campus, a tuition estimator, campus tour information and current OU and student profiles with ways for prospective students to ask questions, are among the improvements on the Web site, said Andy Roop, director of Prospective Student Services.

The profiles provide majors, pictures and interests of current students. Roop said he thinks these give a more personal touch to the Web site and provide students with an alternative to speaking only with administrative staff.

Roop said he knows the Web site will not be the deciding factor in a student's choice in coming to OU, but it will help get students to the campus.

"I hope the Internet never takes away from the campus visit," he said. "But this can open doors."

This fall's freshman class, with 3,833 new freshman students, is the largest in OU's history. The total undergraduate enrollment stands at 19,584 students according to the admissions department.

While some people say OU doesn't need more students recruited, Roop said improvements to recruiting techniques like the Web site help the university get better quality students.

"We're in a really, really good place now where we are able to target students," he said. "Yes, it's a larger pool, but it's more competitive and that's evident by the higher application requirements. We've been able to go from having an open door policy to being selective."

This year for example, in order to obtain automatic admission, students need be in the top 25 percent of their class. In past years, students had to be in the top 30 percent, Roop said.

He said the university is not trying to increase the total number of students on campus, but is, instead, trying to recruit the best and the brightest. The new wait list requirements are allowing the center to manage that.

"It's a way to manage enrollment and not open the flood gates to where students are not getting the level of service they expect," Roop said.

Although the university is becoming more and more competitive, he said it is not an elitist institution.

"We serve all populations," he said. "We also work with students who can't meet the admission requirements at first."

Roop said OU encourages students to go to a junior college and work toward coming to OU later in their college career if they cannot get in during their freshman year.

Roop said the larger number of students affects the whole university population, but he said he thinks the school is at the point where the larger applicant pool will have a positive impact on the university.

"Nobody knows how big is too big," he said. "Let's just get to the point where we get to pick the kind of student we want."
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