University of North Carolina to expand merit based scholarship entry

unc wants to attract more graduating seniors

University trustees today (March 24) finalized a funding plan to launch the expanded scholarship program. The change resulted from a proposal developed by Faculty Chair Judith Wegner to devote 100 percent of all net revenue generated by the university’s trademark licensing program to support general student scholarships.

The college offers excellent merit-based scholarship programs including the Morehead, modeled after the Rhodes at Oxford, and, more recently, the Robertson, offered jointly with Duke University through generous private funding. In addition, the college annually awards more than 100 merit-based scholarships to entering first-year students. Carolina also enrolls more than 130 National Merit Scholars each year. The Carolina First Campaign, a comprehensive fund-raising effort, currently includes new merit- and need-based scholarships among its priorities.

The latest focus on expanding merit-based scholarships resulted from the University of North Carolina's Board of Trustees’ long-standing concern that the school was still losing too many of North Carolina’s highest-achieving high school seniors to out-of-state universities.

Of the 786 top North Carolina students admitted to the university in 2004, fewer than half enrolled. Those top students who chose not to enroll posted an average SAT score of 1,433. 1/2 of those students chose to enroll out of state. College officials attribute the lack of merit-based scholarship offers as major factors in those students’ decisions.