An estimated 3,614 freshmen have enrolled at SF State for the 2008-2009 academic year, making them “the largest freshmen class in SF State history,” said Jo Volkert, associate vice president of enrollment management.

Despite the rise in fees – the cost of enrollment at SF State went up from $1,728 to $1,881 a semester – SF State had received more than 41,000 fall semester applications last year.

But the increase in housing for freshmen and transfer students made many choose SF State over other college campuses, many students said.

SF State now offers the Residence Halls, the Science and Technology Theme Community, the Towers At Centennial Square, the Village At Centennial Square or the University Park South Bedspace to incoming students, according to housing officials.

In addition to the student housing, which offers quick access to the campus, the appeal of a campus in an urban location with all its benefits is a top draw for the class of 2012.

“SFSU is close to the city, which is very different from home, and I really wanted a change,” said Brennan Georgianni, 18, a first-year student and criminal justice major from Orange County.

SF State extended its social capacity by allowing freshmen to find roommates through networking sites before classes even started, made many feel more comfortable and prepared than past freshmen to start life on campus.

“In the past, students would go to Facebook and MySpace and decide, without even talking to their assigned roommate, that this was not a person they wanted to room with,” said Associate Director of Residential Administrative Services Philippe Cumia in an interview last year. “So we decided, now that everybody has these social spaces online, why don’t we just let them choose?”

Since fall 2007 the Housing and Residential Services has offered this new roommate selection process. Incoming freshmen provide their MySpace or Facebook links, and the housing officials then create a list that students are able to access online to check out potential roommates for the dorms.

About 1,944 of the new students chose to live in the dorms with most others living nearby, Volkert said, adding that this group of freshmen is much more diverse than in recent years, with a significantly larger number of Latinos, Volkert said.

This year there are also 120 new international students from countries like Japan, Indonesia and France.

Although the enrollment management does not have the specifics yet, Volkert said she expects the break-down to be the same as last year’s, with about 51 percent of the mostly 18-year-old freshmen coming from other areas in California, including out-of-state and international students, and 49 percent coming from six Bay Area counties (San Francisco, Alameda, Contra Costa, San Mateo, Santa Clara and Marin).

At the time of application most first-year students were planning on attending school full-time, which has been another growing trend among the recent years, according to the enrollment management.

The majors selected by the highest numbers of freshmen were “undeclared” followed by pre-nursing and marketing.