The members of the Class of 2004 are smart, fascinating and diverse, with the largest number of international students in College history, according to Dean of Admissions Karl Furstenberg.
Out of the 1,782 acceptance letters the College sent out, 1,098 recipients are currently set to enroll, although Furstenberg predicts that number will drop to 1,085 by the time Fall term starts, closely bordering the 1,075 ideal class size.
Exactly one quarter of the class graduated first from their high schools, and on average, scored 708 for verbal and 713 for math in the SATs.
"It's a really strong group academically," Furstenberg said.
There are approximately 60 more men than women in the class.
Unlike last year's record-setting number of minority students of 28.8 percent, only 23 percent of the class are students of minority origin. However, '04s are still more diverse than the average Dartmouth class.
Furstenberg attributed the greatest strength of the Class of 2004 to the interesting nature of the students produced as a result of the increased geographic and socio-economic diversity.
"I think it's an interesting group, just from reading the applications," he said, adding that he had gone through and read all the applications sent to the admissions office.
The College's decision to admit more international students and to increase funding for financial aid allowed people from a wider range of backgrounds to enroll than ever before. The average scholarship for students is $18,700, up from $18,250 for the Class of 2003.
Furstenberg said the financial aid initiative introduced two years ago has been very successful in making Dartmouth more competitive.
A total of approximately $8.35 million in scholarships were awarded by the College. This year, the Financial Aid Office also sent an appeal form with the aid award to every admitted student, allowing them to appeal if they had received a higher need-based award from another college -- something that positively affected this year's yield.
Because of this, 6.2 percent of the class are international students, and the '04s represent appoxmiately 850 different high schools, which is unusually high.
Stuyvesant high school and Phillips Exeter academy tied for first for sending the most students, each with 10.
There is a higher proportion of students from western and southern states than before.
The most popular region is the mid-Atlantic area with 302 students, followed by New England with 226, the West with 207, the South with 163 and lastly by the Midwest with 120.
The class represents 48 states.
Furstenberg applauded the "interesting character and quality" of the incoming class.
Some of the more eccentric members of the class are a mime, a flamenco dancer, someone who founded a pet funeral service and another who grew up raising hogs.
A quarter of the class held a part-time job during the school year, 44 percent did community service, 34 percent were involved with music and 31 percent were team captains.
Much of this information may be old news, however, due to the chat rooms for incoming freshmen set up by the College. The first of these chat rooms were created last year.
Furstenberg suggested that many '04s had already met each other and discussed their experiences.
He was also impressed by the fact that 92 percent of applicants disclosed e-mail addresses, the highest percentage so far.
Furstenberg said one of the main concerns incoming students had was regarding the rural setting of the College. He said the Student Life Initiative was not as big of a concern as one might expect, partly because it was first announced more than a year ago.
However, he did say that many students were curious about the future shape of Dartmouth's social life during their years at the College.
Similar to past years, the goals of the Admissions office were to "find the academically most talented students, and then to always be attentive to the diversity of the class."
They also paid attention to the range of different political viewpoints, interests, talents and lifestyles.
