(A) Professor Charlie Duke and Vice President Frank Thomas, as the College's 2 Posse Mentors, provided a report of their activities and the currently enrolled Posse students (21 in all). In the discussion that followed 3 recommendations developed; chose the first year tutorial with special care for Posse students (paying great attention to their areas of interest and need for extensive writing training), expand the writing portion of the pre-enrollment Posse training done from Jan.-Aug. prior to enrollment at the College, and organize a brief conference of regional Posse mentors in order to facilitate the swapping of useful information and successful mentoring strategies. As of Dec. 6 all 21 Posse students at Grinnell were still enrolled, and

(B) Associate Dean Eric Staab resumed leadership of the considerable discussion and information review (dating back 3 academic years) concerning need-blind admission of international applicants. In light of the College's concern over net tuition revenue (NTR), and in light of the current practice of discounting the tuition/fees 100% for all tuition exchange students, tuition remission students, Posse Scholars, QuestBridge Scholars, Russian language assistants, etc., the Committee voted to experiment with a policy of need-sensitive admission for international applicants. The goal is to reduce the number of heavily aided international students and to provide better aid packages to those students. The present practice of giving every needy, accepted international student a ½ tuition grant has created a situation whereby virtually all international students are aided by the College, but many are aided insufficiently. The College may practice need-blind admission for these students but is unable to meet their full financial need, a policy often called admit-deny. The new, experimental policy is designed to ameliorate this situation.

The meeting was adjourned at 1:25 pm.

Next meeting: on Monday, Feb. 7 at noon in the Lower Level Conference Room in the John Chrystal Center. Agenda; (A) Jim Sumner (new students) and Tom Crady (overall) will provide a report on the current admission cycle and enrollment (spring semester, 2005), and (B) consideration of an increase in the advance deposit paid by enrolling new students.

-Jim Sumner