Class of 2023 sets records for enrollment, diversity, and excellence

With more than 50,000 total students for the first time in university history, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has welcomed a record-breaking freshman class for the start of the 2019 academic year. The new freshman class is also the largest, most academically talented and most diverse in the history of the university.

A new high in applications (43,509) yielded the freshman enrollment of 7,665, topping the previous record of 7,609 in fall 2018. Total enrollment of 51,196 surpassed 49,339, the previous record set last fall. Of the total enrollment, there are 33,850 undergraduates, 16,319 graduate students, and 1,027 professional students.

In the College of LAS, the freshman enrollment this fall stands at 2,411, which is the highest number of new freshmen in more than a decade. Prior to 2008, LAS included the Division of General Studies (DGS), which pushed freshman enrollment numbers higher. The DGS is now a campus wide unit.

“We are so pleased to welcome this record-breaking class to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign,” said Chancellor Robert Jones. “As one of the nation’s top public universities, we have an opportunity to provide an excellent education at scale. This new milestone demonstrates our unmatched capacity to provide affordable access to a world-class educational experience.”

College-specific numbers are not yet available, but campus wide the new freshman class has the strongest academic profile of any prior class, with an average SAT of 1348 and a core academic GPA of 3.60. The new freshman class is also the first ever to have an average ACT score over 29.

There are 5,698 students from the state of Illinois, once again making Illinois the largest provider of undergraduate education to the state. These students represent 92 of the 102 counties in the state. Freshmen from central and southern Illinois have increased 18 percent.

The Class of 2023 is also the most diverse class in history with 23.2 percent coming from underrepresented backgrounds, with increases in African American students and Latinx students and a higher percentage of first-generation students at 24.7 percent. The 949 international students are more globally diverse, hailing from 40 countries, more than in previous years.

The university welcomed 1,448 transfer students, the highest number in the last 20 years. The Class of 2023 includes students from 43 states. The College of LAS welcomed 676 first-term transfer students. 

More than 30 percent of new freshmen and new transfer students from the state of Illinois qualified for the new Illinois Commitment program that was announced in August of 2018.  Illinois Commitment is a financial aid program that guarantees free tuition and fees to any admitted student with a family income of $61,000 or less, the median income of state residents.

“The Illinois Commitment program has helped the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign drive quality, size, and diversity of students,” said admissions director Andy Borst. “I’m really pleased to see that even more of the state’s best and brightest students decided to enroll at Illinois this year, and we were also excited to see so much geographic diversity across the state – including a significant increase in central and southern Illinois.”