Freshmen minority enrollment
rises
 By
Dave Stephens
Assistant Campus Editor
Purdue is home to a diverse group of students.
That diversity increased with this year's freshmen
class, which enrolls11 percent more African-American students and 10
percent more Hispanic students than last year.
"We are very pleased with the diversity of the
incoming class," said Doug Christiansen. "We still have a long ways
to go, but we've really tried to make this a diverse campus."
Christiansen said all students admitted to the
University meet the same requirements, but Purdue does encourage minority
students to attend.
"Diversity is important because it allows us to
meet and associate with people from different backgrounds, which makes
the academic experience more beneficial for all involved," said Christiansen.
"Diversity allows us to look at problems with different perspectives."
The total enrollment of African-American, American
Indian, Asian-American and Hispanic students on campus is up slightly
this semester from last year, from 9.2 to 9.3 percent of the total students
enrolled on the West Lafayette campus.
Enrollment of international students has also increased
since a year ago, rising from 11.7 percent in 2000 to 12.2 percent this
fall, for a total of 4,695 international students on campus. Of public
universities in the United States, Purdue ranks near the top in number
of international students enrolled.
Dorothy Simpson-Taylor, director of the Diversity
Resource office, said that students benefit from having a diverse campus
atmosphere.
"I think that Purdue is a laboratory for the world,
and that as a laboratory we need to mirror the complexity of the communities
of different people and simulate the world we live in," said Simpson-Taylor.
She compared the skills students learn in their
discipline to the skills students can learn by interacting with people
different from themselves.
"I'm counting on the Purdue graduates being the
leaders of the future," she said. "We're at a pivotal point in the world
and have some real opportunities to help foster better understanding
through diversity."
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