Carnegie Mellon Qatar new student enrollment reaches new highs

The incoming student body is made up of 90 new students and 8 transfers, deriving from a focused and highly successful local and regional recruiting campaign.

The fall 2009 Carnegie Mellon Qatar freshman admissions cycle was a rewarding one with 1095 prospective students applying to one of Carnegie Mellon Qatar's three world-class majors: business administration, computer science and information systems.

The rate of applications for 2009 was up 67% when compared to the applicant pool in 2008 of 657 prospective students. The largest increase in applications came from within Qatar, representing 74% of the applicant pool, followed by an increase of approximately 25% in students applying from around the GCC. Qatari nationals made up 37% of the applicant pool.

'Our efforts throughout the year have been realized as we welcome a group of very bright and talented new students to the Carnegie Mellon family,'

says Bryan S. Zerbe, Director of Admissions at Carnegie Mellon Qatar.

'In particular in Qatar we offered a number of pre-college programs focused on our majors and in which many local students participated. These programs included competitions and tournaments on creation and innovation such as Ibtikar, CS4Qatar and Botball, as well as the Summer College Preview Program. We have also invested a lot of time developing relationships with secondary schools in Qatar to ensure that the students are accurately informed about our programs and the application procedures.'

Of the 1095 applications, 235 were offered admission. The admissions process at Carnegie Mellon Qatar takes a holistic approach, taking into consideration factors such as high school grades, recommendations, interviews, extra curricular activities as well as results on competency tests. Only students judged to be fully capable of meeting the high standards of the university are offered admission. Ninety new students make up the class of 2013.

The top school feeding the enrollment is the Academic Bridge Program, which is a preparatory year for high achieving school leavers aimed at bridging the gap between secondary school and university.

The convocation ceremony welcoming the Class of 2013 is scheduled for August 23 in the Atrium of the Carnegie Mellon Qatar building in Education City.