Most of the issue with these smart Union kids is they all want to experience something outside the Tulsa bubble. They also are driven somewhat by the political climate in the state. These are the kids when Ryan Walters scream kids shouldn't be reading this book or that book run to the nearest book store to grab it. I know at least in part, my son wanted not to be in Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas, or Missouri. I really wanted him to apply to Arkansas and Mizzou. No dice. He knows TU is a good school and has a great engineering school. He's worked with LoPresti some and knows he could get a great education there with plenty of options for after undergrad. These kids want to experience different parts of the world and they can't do that in Tulsa. I finally understand why local athletes like to choose other locations that may be comparable basketball or football programs even though Tulsa is the superior school overall.
And TU did give my son the most $ so far, but my son also has a grandmother who may have told him she'll pay for where he wants to go. I don't know for sure because I wasn't in the room where it happened.
As for TU getting to matriculating classes of 1000 or so, that's great. I'm not so worried about the housing situation for a while. There are plenty of students who want to move off campus as soon as they can because it's a cheaper option. Instead of a 2 yr requirement they could move to 1. John and Lottie hold about 250 students each, Twin West holds about 120 (used to be 180). Twin South has a capacity of about 180 but that building needs to be razed and rebuilt. LaFortune can hold about 160. I don't know what the newest residence hall holds, maybe 200? Before it was built you had a residence hall capacity of about 1200. I would think it's close to that still. I'm trying to remember what USA apartments held. I feel like I hade about 700 residents in the 3 areas. I think the new apartments hold slightly more than that so maybe 1500 total spaces assuming everyone is in a single bedroom in the apts. Sorority row holds 180 students (30 per house, 6 houses). No one really knows what the capacity of fraternity row is. Maybe assume roughly the same. Between all on campus housing options, you have roughly 3000 spaces give or take a few based on room reconfigurations that have occurred since I worked there. Assuming TU is able to raise its UG population to about 4500 through all of these increases in admissions, you are still in good shape guaranteeing about 67% of UG students a space on campus. Right now there is a good number of grad students who take up apartment space. The question would be where would TU put additional housing? There's not much space left. At one point there was talk of expanding Twin to 6 floors. The building was built such that they could if they ever got to that point. Don't think that would be economically feasible any longer given the age of the building. You might as well do the Vegas business mod, tear down Twin South and build a 6-8 story high rise and double the capacity. That doesn't get you a ton more capacity though.
