The enrollment of incoming freshmen reached a record high at Dominican University of California when classes started Monday with 343 new students, an 18 percent increase from last fall.

Of those 343 students, 181 are of minority descent. 

New transfer student enrollment grew 46 percent to 105  from 72 a year ago. Dominican also received 105 new transfer students, up 46 percent from 72 new transfers last school year.

The incoming class boosted Dominican's fall 2010 total enrollment to 2,194 — another record —  up from 1,930 last fall.

For the seventh year in a row Dominican was named one of the top universities in the West by U.S. News and World Report.

Dominican will host a California gubernatorial debate between Democratic candidate Jerry Brown and Republican candidate Meg Whitman on Oct. 12. The event, to be televised statewide by NBC,  will be held at Angelico Hall and moderated by NBC News' Tom Brokaw.