Amid rise in applications, UNC acceptance rate decreases 7 percent in 5 years

In the past five years, UNC has experienced a consistent rise in the number of applicants seeking admission to the University.

During the 2019 college application cycle, UNC received just under 42,500 applications and during the 2024 application cycle, it received over 66,000, according to the University’s common data set. As a result of this rise in applications, UNC’s acceptance rate declined from 22.6 percent to 15.6 percent during that period. 

Vice Provost of Enrollment Rachelle Feldman said she attributes this increase in applications to UNC’s institutional reputation.

“The atmosphere and school spirit, the way our students are very collaborative, the fact that we focus on developing leaders and giving people broad opportunities, that the faculty are of quality and care about teaching — I think for all of those reasons, we have seen a continual increase in interest in North Carolina,” she said.

She also noted the appeal of the University’s affordability, saying that UNC is one of the few top-five-ranked public universities that meet the full financial needs of students.

Private College Admissions Coach Camy Sorge cited alternative reasons for the increase in applications. She said in the face of rising concerns over job security and artificial intelligence, more applicants are seeking admission to colleges with higher rankings.

“They want to feel like, 'If I go to school, it's going to make a difference,'” she said. “And so I think that makes people concentrate: ‘Well, I'll choose a school that has a really strong reputation, has a really high ranking, and that will make it more likely that it'll be worth it.’”

Independent Educational Consultant Neisha Frank said as top universities receive more applications each year, their acceptance rates drop. In turn their U.S. News and World Report ranking, and therefore their desirability for prospective students, goes up.

Out-of-state students face an even greater challenge when seeking admission. Due to state law, only 18 percent of admitted students can come from outside North Carolina, while 82 percent must be in-state residents. 

Vice Provost Feldman said, “North Carolinians have a much greater percentage chance of getting admitted to the University, which makes a lot of sense, because we're here to serve the people of North Carolina."

Feldman also said that she and Chancellor Lee Roberts are discussing plans to expand University enrollment in the future.

“Our hope is to grow smartly, but somewhat gradually, over the next 10 years to be able to accommodate more people, especially from North Carolina, so that we don't see our acceptance rates continue to fall,” she said.

In the meantime, Sorge and Frank said they encourage their students who want to attend highly-ranked universities to take the most rigorous course load available to them and make the highest grades they can.

Sorge stressed the idea that while competition at top universities is fierce, there are thousands of other institutions for prospective students. She said there are over 2,000 accredited four-year universities in the U.S., and only around 300 of them have an admissions rate of lower than 50 percent. 

Additionally, Frank said that the number of prospective students who are of typical college-going age is decreasing due to the declining in birth rates following the 2008 recession. She said this decrease may cause small liberal arts colleges to close.

“We are going to see, overall, less students trying to get into college, which means more and more small colleges are probably going to fold,” she said. “But these schools — like UNC, UT-Austin —they're just going to become more and more competitive, because everyone still wants to go there, despite the fact there are less people.”

@adelepmorris17

@dailytarheel | university@dailytarheel.com