The Oklahoma A&M Regents approved a proposal at their Friday meeting that will gradually raise the admissions requirements for incoming freshmen and transfer students.
Current incoming freshmen must either have a 22 ACT score, rank in the top one-third of their graduating class and have a 3.0 GPA or have a 3.0 in 15 “core” courses with at least a 20 ACT score. Over the next three school years, the minimum ACT score will be raised to 24 without grades or 21 with a 3.0 in the “core” courses and the class rank cutoff will be raised to the top quarter.
Currently, transfer students are accepted with a 1.70 GPA and less than 30 completed hours. New transfer students with 59 or fewer completed hours will be required to have a 2.25 and those with 60 or more completed hours will be required to have a 2.0.
The university has been growing too fast for the state legislature to provide proportionate funding. This action will theoretically stunt the student body’s growth and minimize the impact of the 90 currently open faculty positions.
This measure, coupled with the recent scholarship contribution from the Chesapeake Energy Corp., might just be what the school needs to help entice top high school seniors to come here by providing a slightly more academically engaging atmosphere and slightly trim down class sizes in general education courses.
This move obviously does not guarantee that more people will strongly consider the school, and could be viewed as a violation of the land grant philosophy, but considering the financial straits we are in, this is the only viable option that does not eliminate jobs or make an OSU education financially impossible to current students.
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