High school seniors from the North flock to southern universities: report
WSJ columnists cite college counselors reporting high school seniors are flocking to southern universities over the country's prized east coast and Ivy League institutions.
High school seniors are flocking to southern universities like Clemson and Alabama over America’s most prestigious colleges in the North, a column in the Wall Street Journal reports.
"A growing number of high-school seniors in the North are making an unexpected choice for college: They are heading to Clemson, Georgia Tech, South Carolina, Alabama and other universities in the South," columnists Douglas Belkin and Andrea Fuller wrote.
Belkin and Fuller wrote that although far more students applied to Ivy League schools than in the past 20 years, Clemson and Georgia Institute of Technology "have seen even a bigger spike in interest."
The column explained further that these southern schools boast career opportunities, an alluring Greek fraternity and sorority life, and sports entertainment experience, especially in football.
Furthermore, the columnists note the southern schools’ lower tuition costs and weather have become appealing to high school seniors who are overlooking the country's competitive East Coast universities.
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They cite college counselors in reporting that "many teens are eager to trade the political polarization ripping apart campuses in New England and New York for the sense of community epitomized by the South’s football Saturdays."
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Per the Wall Street Journal column, "The number of Northerners going to Southern public schools went up 84% over the past two decades, and jumped 30% from 2018 to 2022, a Wall Street Journal analysis of the latest available Education Department data found."
For example, the University of Tennessee in Knoxville has attracted more freshmen from the Northeast over the past 20 years. The total freshmen from the Northeast increased to nearly 600 in a class of about 6,800 from around 50 in 2002.
The University of Mississippi, in Oxford, saw an increase from 11 to more than 200 in a class of approximately 4,500 in 2022.
The University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa has also seen a spike in incoming first-year students, the column reported further.
"At Alabama, applications were up more than 600% in the same period — about three times as much as bids to attend Harvard," the columnists wrote.
"Southern academic stalwarts, such as Duke, Tulane, Emory and Vanderbilt, have long drawn their share of students from up North, but the recent uptick of students going to the South is fueled by attendance at public universities," the columnists added.
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