The student-faculty ratio rose from 9-to-1 to 10-to-1 for fall 2011 from the previous year, according to data provided to the Justice by the University Registrar.

While this increase is not drastic, both Senior Vice President for Students and Enrollment Andrew Flagel and Dean of Arts and Sciences Susan Birren have acknowledged the potential impact the increased size of the student body will have both on class sizes and the student-faculty ratio and are planning on taking measures to ensure close student-faculty interaction.

The issue of an increase in the potentially enlarged student-faculty ratio stems from the University's decision in 2009 to increase the incoming first-year class in order to raise revenues, an increase that has been most noticeable with this year's first-year class.

According to the 2011-2012 Common Data Set, the Class of 2015 consists of approximately 858 students. In an Sept. 12, 2011 email to the Justice, Vice President of Students and Enrollment Keenyn McFarlane wrote that 108 midyears would enroll in January, bringing the size of the Class to 966 students.

By contrast, 690 students enrolled for the Class of 2014 in the fall, according to the 2010-2011 Common Data Set.

McFarlane wrote in his email that 108 students enrolled in January, for a total of 798 students.

Dean of Admissions Mark Spencer explained in a Sept. 12 phone interview with the Justice that the University would maintain this goal of enrolling 855 students for the Class of 2016.

According to interviews with both Birren and Flagel, the increased number of students will inevitably impact the number of students in classes, but they do not believe it will do so drastically, and said that close student-faculty interaction will remain a top priority.

"While I expect that changes in class sizes will be small, we don't have all of those numbers yet.  Our goal of maintaining a close relationship between our students and the faculty will require continuing thought and a commitment to ongoing planning," said Birren in September.

The numbers from the CDS seem to corroborate Birren's claim. According to the data, there are 14 classes with over 100 students enrolled, 38 classes with 40 to 49 students, 47 classes with 30 to 39 students, 109 classes with 20 to 29 students, 278 classes with 10 to 19 students and 111 classes with 2 to 9 students. These numbers are largely in line with those of the previous year.

University President Frederick Lawrence emphasized in an interview with the Justice that this issue should be prioritized.

"If the size of the class gets a little bigger and the size of the faculty gets a little smaller, your student-to-faculty ratio obviously is going to increase. And that's a concern. I would say that if we're talking about something that goes from something in the nines to something in the 10s that's a concern because it's increasing, but it still is better than the vast majority of research universities in the country." he said.

Flagel said that this issue would be incorporated into the University's Strategic Planning Committee, which is being led by Provost Steve Goldstein ‘78 over the course of 18 months.

"In the midst of [the Strategic Planning Report] you will see a lot of talk about where the institution really ought to be and a very big sense of trajectories. In the long term, one of the questions that we have to wrestle with is how much growth would make sense for Brandeis, given where we want Brandeis to be for faculty and students and what [that means] for space," he said.

"In the short term, what we have been looking at is a faculty really thoughtful and considerate in their planning about interactions with students, and one of the things we need to work towards is preserving that atmosphere," he said.

Flagel also remarked that there is little physical space for classes to massively expand, presenting another incentive to maintain the low student-faculty ratio.

"If we wanted a lot of large classes, we would have built a lot of large classrooms. In order to utilize our space effectively, we would need to maintain class sizes," he explained.

In regard to methods of preserving the atmosphere, Birren said that the administration had acknowledged this dynamic as an issue, although they had not been having specific conversations about it yet and said there would be discussions about the different mechanisms that could be used to maintain small classes.

"I would say that we are committed to maintaining the Brandeis tradition of meaningful small group interactions between students and faculty and that there are many scenarios for making sure that happens including providing opportunities for students to take small classes. We are in the early stages of assessing the impact of having more students on campus and in designing mechanisms to make sure that all students can get to know their professors," she said.

Neither Flagel nor Birren said that they had spoken with professors about this particular topic.

—Andrew Wingens contributed reporting.