This time last year, University Park residence halls were bursting at the seams with incoming freshmen, but now the campus gets to tighten its belt a few notches.

"The first year's class this fall met the targeted numbers that admissions were giving us," associate director of housing Lynn Dubois said. "We were able to set aside enough space for them."

Last year, a record 8,025 incoming students arrived at Penn State in the fall and greatly tested the limits of the campus and its facilities, according to the Penn State Fact Book online at www.budget.psu.edu.

Though this year's official numbers are not yet in, Robert Pangborn, vice president and dean of undergraduate education, said the anticipated freshman headcount will fall around 6,870, nearly 1,150 fewer than last year.

Pangborn called the class size "intentionally smaller."

To handle the extra pressure last fall, many freshmen were placed in supplemental housing and some had to be housed with Resident Assistants (RAs) until space was available.

"That wasn't a good situation," said David Manos, assistant director for East Halls. "[The RAs] are here to counsel the other students and need to be provided with their own space to do so."

University Food Services felt the strain, too. Last year, Lisa Wandel, associate director of Housing and Food Services, said dining hours had to be extended and extra labor added to students' part-time work schedules.

"Our counts were up in the dining commons," she said of the increased student traffic.
Though Penn State President Graham Spanier has pledged to keep class sizes in future years small enough to stay below his proposed "enrollment ceiling" of 40 to 42 thousand, lines stretching out the doors in the dining halls won't go away any time soon and neither will supplemental housing.

"The demand for campus housing by returning students exceeds space available," Dubois said. "Supplemental housing enables us to keep our occupancy. Because we have many students who aren't coming back who haven't told us they aren't returning, occupancy would be below what is projected."

Manos also said supplemental housing enables students to attend University Park who otherwise wouldn't be able to.

"Our experiences have been that, overall, the situation is positive for students," he said.
Dubois said even if rooms aren't filled, Housing still has fixed-budget items like cleaning the bathrooms. The money for these budget items comes out of the students' room and board fees.
It is largely because of supplemental living that Housing was able to offer contracts through eLiving to all students who had requested one this year -- something that they have not always been able to do in years past.

"Things went quite well this year, and there was really no impact on the students that were living on campus that wanted to come back," Dubois said. "Last year, we had a higher request rate and were not able to offer everyone a contract."

In 2006, 1,200 students who requested housing contracts were denied and 700 were placed in supplemental housing.

Dubois said all efforts are being made to increase regular residential spaces on campus. Plans are currently being reviewed to convert the dining hall space in McElwain Hall into more housing units.

"Right now, we are looking to see what type of situation we have," Dubois said.