Lower Tuition Leads To Higher Enrollment At 3 NC Universities

Three North Carolina universities that drastically dropped tuition are seeing record undergraduate enrollment.

Elizabeth City State University, The University of North Carolina at Pembroke, and Western Carolina University were benefactors of the NC Promise program, which is funded by the state legislature. The program allowed the schools to lower their tuition to $1,000 a year for in-state undergraduates and $5,000 a year for out-of-state students.

The News and Observer reports undergraduate enrollment is up 19 percent at Elizabeth City State, 14 percent at UNC Pembroke and over 6 percent at WCU.

The schools have seen particularly high increases in students transferring from other schools, with many coming in from community colleges.

One enrollment official at WCU said the reduced tuition program has acted “like a booster rocket” for admissions and has exceeded all expectations.