Success 101
University of Chicago president Don Randel has won over a tough home crowd—all the while enacting most of his ousted predecessor's controversial agenda. His smooth transition demonstrates the art of persuasion, and it's good news for the school.
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Sonnenschein's grandest project is a $180-million Interdivisional Research Building that will run along the south side of 57th Street from Ellis Avenue to Drexel Avenue and replace the Visual Sciences Center, Whitman Laboratory, and Phemister Hall. Ribbon cutting is set for September 2005. The $130-million Comer Children's Hospital is expected to open in 2004 on the east side of Maryland Avenue from 57th to 58th Street. The 242,000-square-foot facility is named for Gary Comer, the founder of Lands' End, who gave $21 million. In the fall of 2003, students who have been working out in the same gym used 63 years ago by the last U. of C. football team to play in the Big Ten will be able to swim laps and sweat off their stress in the Gerald Ratner Athletics Center on the southwest corner of Ellis Avenue and 55th Street.
Perhaps the most immediate impact on the campus, though, comes from the expanded student body. "I was brought in to increase the size of the applicant pool so that they could increase the size of the College without sacrificing quality," says Behnke. A serious concern was visibility. Chicago was a powerhouse within the academic world, but it was rarely mentioned in high school counselors' offices. Fewer than 5,500 students applied in 1996. With a budget increase of 40 percent, Behnke spent a year conducting focus groups of faculty and enrolled students, who emphasized that Chicago's best chance was to sell brains-literally. During these informal interviews, "The Life of the Mind" emerged as a theme.
Still, the mind responds to bright, catchy brochures. The first step in re-invigorating the admissions process was to throw out the old materials, which Behnke called "generic and unexciting." "They made us look like every other school," he says. In the spring of 1998, his staff unveiled an eye-catching guidebook with a cover photo featuring gargoyles perched atop the William Rainey Harper Memorial Library and the sentence: "Warning: Study in this university is known to cause thinking, occasionally deep thinking." Applications for this fall's freshman class topped 8,000-a school record. Average SAT scores have risen, from 1,230-1,410 in 1996 to 1,330-1,480 in 2001.
Behnke says the improvements are a combination of a strong product and better marketing. Chicago now offers nearly four times as many college visiting days for prospective students as it once did. The percentage of applicants admitted has dropped from 62 percent in 1997 to 44 percent last year. One figure with room for improvement, however, is the yield-students who are accepted and then choose to enroll. Since 1997, the yield has risen just three percentage points to 33.2 (a figure that suggests that Chicago is still not the first choice of many elite students). By comparison, Harvard's yield is above 80 percent.
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