Oregon Public Broadcasting

Admissions’ officers at Oregon’s private colleges and universities are eagerly opening envelopes Tuesday.

After a rollercoaster fall and winter, they’re collecting the last deposits from college-bound freshmen this week - the last indicators of who’s coming to school next fall. Rob Manning reports.

From counseling office party: “Are you seniors? OK, I’ve got to take your picture."

Every May 1st, seniors at Portland’s Lincoln High swing by the counseling office to have cake, and exhale. It’s deposit day, when high school seniors commit to the schools where they’ll be college freshmen.

Samantha Eisen: “It’s a huge relief that I’m done with everything, and I’ve settled on a school, yeah.”

Lincoln senior, Samantha Eisen is headed to the University of Seattle, after flirting with Loyola Marymount in Los Angeles. Eisen’s family is relatively well off, but she says cost and the economy were factors.

Samantha Eisen: “It was a little bit of pressure, I was kind of freaking out about how much Loyola Marymount and other schools I was applying to were going to cost, and Seattle is a lot less.”

Samantha’s mom, Eliza Earhardt-Eisen, was at Lincoln for the May 1st celebration with seniors because she volunteers in the counseling office. She recalls that students and parents at the beginning of the year were worried. That’s because there’s a mini-baby boom in this senior class, making admissions more competitive.

Eliza Earhardt-Eisen: “But then as the year progressed, and the economy, it sort of changed the whole complexion of the process. I think schools were worried that kids wouldn’t come and wouldn’t be able to pay, and wouldn’t fill their classes. I think kids got much more anxious about being able to afford school. So it ended up being sort of a strange year in that way.”

It was a strange year from the perspective of private colleges, as well. They saw lots of applications, but more families asking for more financial aid. And a number of administrators, like Chris Sweet at the Pacific Northwest College of Art, saw deposits come in at the last minute.

Chris Sweet: “There was a while there, where we were pretty far behind, where maybe we had half as many deposits as we had in past years. But as the May 1 deadline approached, we actually now are 15 percent ahead of last year.”

Sweet is not the only one who’s been sweating it out the last few days. Lewis and Clark officials were behind on deposits, until they began flooding in this week.

The University of Portland did adjust its recruitment, and keyed in on another trend. UP admissions’ director, Jason McDonald says he focused on students closer to Portland.

Jason McDonald: “We really increased our admit pool from Oregon and Washington, thinking we’d get more of those students than we would from say, Colorado or Arizona.”

UP focused financial assistance toward those close-to-Portland students, and it accepted more students, just to hedge its bets. And the the “close to home” trend that UP is capitalizing on, boosted Willamette University’s numbers, allowing the school to be more selective. Willamette admissions’ head, Madeleine Rhyneer.

Madeleine Rhyneer: “I do think more people will stay, if not a lot closer to home, at least more close to home than they might have in a different economic climate.”

Administrators have also noticed more families showing their financial aid packages from competing colleges, in hopes of getting schools to increase their offers. 

In the end, even pretty wealthy schools like Portland’s Reed College could only do so much. Admissions’ director, Paul Marthers, is convinced the economy kept some students away from private colleges.

Paul Marthers: “More families said to me, ‘my son or daughter would really like to come here, but it’s just a matter of finances, so the choice has been a lower-cost, usually state institution.”

College counselors at Lincoln High agree with Marthers, that some kids are headed to University of Oregon, instead of private colleges this year. Counselor, Annie Walsh says parents have been more focused on costs this year.

Annie Walsh: “I do think parents clearly had influence on all this, but I think this all came down to the best bang for their buck, so to speak, and what the programs were offering.”

And now, even with the deposit deadline past, administrators haven’t quite exhaled. Madeleine Rhyneer at Willamette worries that the economy might squeeze parents this summer.

Madeleine Rhyneer: “A family member, a parent, loses a job, you know, there’s a loss of hours, a forced furlough for which they’re unpaid, and a family says ‘oh my goodness, we really can’t afford to make this happen.’ So, if I’m lying awake at night worrying about anything, it’s that.”