Such a deal: You're in! With a tuition discount! But is it worth it?
Competing for a shrinking numbers of 18-year-olds, hundreds of not-very-selective universities are admitting students who haven't applied, reports Bloomberg's Amanda Albright. Private colleges' "direct admissions" offers come with financial aid. But it still may be a dubious deal.
Wingate University near Charlotte, North Carolina offered $24,000 in financial aid to 20,000 students who used the Common App, Niche and a state-run system called NC College Connect, she writes. About 500 accepted, making up more than half of the freshman class.
Annual tuition is listed at $44,000, but room, board and other expenses push the average cost above $60,000 a year. So students who choose Wingate are paying about $200,000 if they earn a degree in four years. Most do not. About half complete a bachelor's degree in six years.
“The college search process is already so stressful,” said Eva Baucom, vice president of enrollment management at Wingate. “In our minds, they’ve already done a lot of the hard work. They’ve proven that they meet our admissions criteria. So why make students jump through additional hoops and more stress if we can avoid that?”
Public university systems, including California State University, are expanding direct admissions, writes Albright. "Advocates say the strategy encourages more diverse applicants, like first-generation students, by removing barriers to entry and boosting awareness of the often-generous scholarships available at private institutions.
Niche, which offers advice on college admissions, offers a direct admissions tool on the website. "Based on details from their Niche profiles, students can be immediately offered entry and a scholarship that the company says averages $17,500 per year."
Luke Skurman, chief executive officer of Niche, said students today are used to “pressing a button and having an Uber or Uber Eats arrive instantaneously,” and he wanted to make college applications as seamless as that.
Nazareth University, located near Rochester, New York, uses both Niche and the Common App to make 40,000 direct admissions offers each year. Students who are interested fill out a form of intent to finalize their application. The listed tuition is $44,000 a year, but students are offered $20,000 to $25,000 discounts, depending on GPA.
Few students pay the "sticker" price at non-elite private institutions, writes Albright. "A survey released in 2026 found the tuition discount had reached 57 percent for first-time students."
The analysis of Wingate does not make sense. If the sticker price of tuition is $44K and the total cost of attendance is $60K, AND students are getting a $24K annual discount on tuition, that would total up to $144K over 4 years, not $200K. This would be before any federal or state aid came into the picture. According to Wingate's own page (https://www.wingate.edu/admissions/financial-aid/cost), a majority of students pay a total of $10-20K per year; average borrowing is about $27,500 total (not per year) for 4 years.
This tuition discount of 54% at Wingate is for pikers. We can only dream of that low a discount here. My institution has almost exactly the same sticker price for tuition and a…
Top majors at Wingate University according to US News:
Business, Management, Marketing, and Related Support Services 20%
Parks, Recreation, Leisure, Fitness, and Kinesiology 16%
Psychology 13%
Biological and Biomedical Sciences 12%
Education 7%
It has less than 4k students, is 20% African-American, 20% are in Greek organizations and around 75% live on campus. If one did not get into UNC-Chapel Hill or NC States, then going to Wingate would be an alternative for students looking for a more stereotypical college experience in a college town rather than going to one of North Carolina's state commuter universities.
If a student wants to be a physical therapist or occupational therapist or plan into going into the some form of family business, Wingate…
Ah, I remember when they used to send unsolicited credit cards to lure people into debt servitude. That got outlawed.
I wonder if these direct admissions are across all majors?
Got curious earlier today about the detail of men skipping college. Found the following interesting facts:
Such first years are basically just 13th grade, priced deceptively. However, the big costs paid are the opportunity costs; instead, state citizens should break up systems like Cal State (full disclosure, where I spent one year), with regions converting their campuses into universities of applied sciences responsive to regional economies, while most of these private universities should go out of business, with their youth transitioning instead from the colleges of higher education they should have started at 16 so as to complete their apprenticeships with Workforce Pell Grants for specific programmes.