Lynse Briney had trouble getting into all the classes she needed this semester, even though she’s a senior. At the end of January, Iowa State announced a record spring-semester enrollment of 25,088, up 755 students from last year’s 24,333, and slightly less than the fall-semester enrollment of 26,845, another record-setter.As Iowa State continues to set enrollment records while receiving less tax-dollar support from the state legislature, concerns have been voiced on how the university can maintain the quality of education.David Hopper, president of the Faculty Senate, said he is pleased with the increase but worried about finances.”There has been no coordinating increase in resources or faculty that will put us in a position to deal with the increase in enrollment,” said Hopper, professor of veterinary diagnostic and production animal medicine. “Class size is always an issue when you don’t have expanding resources.”He said the university’s plans for dealing with the increase currently are being discussed by the Faculty Senate and ISU administrators.”At this moment, I do not know what is being done to accommodate students, and this is of great concern,” he said. “If enrollment increases next year, it will probably exacerbate the problem.”Interim President Richard Seagrave said the increase is a “break-even proposition.” “The university will make more money from tuition, but classes are larger,” he said. “We’ve told our students that part of our increased tuition next year is [intended] to make class sizes smaller.”At least half of the increase is due to greater retention, Seagrave said.”More people are staying in school, and we are becoming more attractive to Iowa freshmen and community college transfers, we hope,” he said.In addition to the record-setting enrollment, the university is setting a trend toward temporary faculty, said Max Wortman, distinguished professor of management. Tenure-track faculty has decreased by 2 percent in the last eight years, from 1,475 to 1,450, he said. Temporary faculty has increased by almost 17 percent, from 300 to 350, Wortman said, and students are the ones who are disadvantaged.”It’s pretty clear that we do not have enough faculty,” said Wortman, chair of the Faculty Senate council on academic affairs. “Approximately a quarter of the classes taught here are taught by temporary faculty or professional and scientific faculty. If I were a student, I would not be very happy.”The larger classes, a result of reduced faculty and increased enrollment, do not give students the tools they will need after graduation, Wortman said. Short-answer or essay tests are not practical in large classes, so teachers rely more on multiple-choice tests, reducing the amount of critical thinking students do, he said.Brent Bruton, professor of sociology, said introductory sociology lecture classes have traditionally been large, and the atmosphere may not always be conducive to learning.”Students may define themselves as an audience rather than a class,” he said. “Some of the collaborative learning we are encouraged to use is harder to use in a large lecture.”Bruton said the best way to learn in a large lecture is to sit in the front.”Some of my students say ‘If you sit in the front row, it doesn’t matter how many people are behind you,’ and I think that’s true to a point,” he said.Some large lectures are broken into recitations — smaller groups led by teaching assistants. Debbie Martinez, teaching assistant for Sociology 134, said smaller groups give students more individual attention.”The students have more of a chance to ask questions,” said Martinez, graduate student in sociology. “A lot of my students are from hometowns smaller than the lectures they have.”Briney, senior in biology, said the two teaching assistants she has this semester are more helpful than her professors. But, Briney said she can’t learn at all if she can’t get into the classes she needs to graduate.