Data released this morning by University officials show that the University student population has reached an all-time record. And amidst this year’s growth there has been a rise in underrepresented minority students in the freshman class — though officials admitted that because of new reporting requirements, this year’s numbers are not directly comparable to last year.

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The Office of the Registrar reported this morning that overall student enrollment for the University’s Ann Arbor campus is at 41,924 students for the fall semester. The increase is the result of a 3.1-percent increase in the number of undergraduate students and a 6.7-percent increase in the number of graduate and professional students.

Contributing in part to that growth was a larger than expected incoming freshman class. University officials had predicted over the summer that freshmen enrollment would increase by about 300 students from last year, which would have brought the incoming class to about 6,350. However, the data released this morning show that the number was even higher than that prediction, with 6,496 freshmen enrolling this fall.

Last year, officials announced that overall enrollment at the University reached an all time high with 41,674 students. Of those students, 26,208 were undergraduates, while 15,466 were graduate students. At the same time last year, officials acknowledged a slip in the number of underrepresented minority students on campus.

Perhaps most notable in the data released this morning is an increase in the underrepresented minority student community at the University. Officials reported that underrepresented minority students made up 10.6 percent of this year’s freshman class, which is up from 9.1 percent last year.

However, that increase could be, at least in part, due to revised reporting guidelines under the Higher Education Opportunity Act, which have altered the way student ethnicity data are collected and reported.

In a statement released this morning, Lester Monts, the senior vice provost for academic affairs at the University, said the data demonstrated the University is continuing to uphold it’s mission.

“Since its earliest years, the University of Michigan has offered an uncommon education to the leaders and the best among the men and women of this state and far beyond,” Monts said in a statement. “We have upheld that tradition with this exceptional entering class.”

And while applications from and offers of admission to underrepresented minority students have increased in recent years — reaching an all-time high last year and resulting in a larger underrepresented minority student community on campus this year — ethnic diversity on campus has been decreasing in the last several years.

In fact, as a percentage of the total student population, the number of underrepresented minority students at the University has fallen every year since 2003, University records show. The records, known as Form 816, also show that as a real number, the underrepresented minority population on campus has decreased every year since 2005.

Last fall, University officials reported that underrepresented minority enrollment fell by 11.5 percent in one year. A sizable percentage, the number was said to be equivalent to 69 students.

Leading University officials, including University President Mary Sue Coleman, have repeatedly told The Michigan Daily over the past year that more must be done to encourage underrepresented minority students to enroll at the University after being accepted.

“It’s concerning to us,” Coleman said at this time last year of the decreases in underrepresented minority enrollment.