BLACKSBURG, Va. (AP) — The incoming freshman class at Virginia Tech will be the most diverse in the school's history.

The Roanoke Times reports that 34 percent of the Blacksburg school's 6,400 first-year students are classified as either as first-generation, low-income or minority students.

The school's goal is to reach 40 percent by 2022.

Virginia Tech will next year begin using a simplified, streamlined application designed to make applying for financial aid more accessible.

The 6,400-member freshman class is deliberately smaller than last year's class of 6,800. The larger class created a housing strain on campus, requiring some double-occupancy dorm rooms to be converted to triples.

The smaller class comes despite a record number of applications that exceeded 32,000.

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Information from: The Roanoke Times, http://www.roanoke.com

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