Three schools say they were the first public colleges in the United States, but only the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill actually gave out degrees as a public school in the 1700s. UNC, started by the North Carolina government in 1789, is seen as the best in public education. It’s the main campus of the North Carolina University system and is known for its library with lots of historical records about North Carolina, a sports department that has won 50 national championships in NCAA Division I, and a campus in a lively college town.
UNC alumni, also known as Tar Heels because of North Carolina’s history of making tar and pitch, make up a large and enthusiastic group. Tar Heels become close friends while cheering for UNC’s sports teams against Duke (which is only 8 miles away from campus) and UVA (with whom UNC has had a rivalry for 132 years, known as the “South’s Oldest Rivalry”). They also engage in lively discussions as members of the Dialectic and Philanthropic Societies and learn from Nobel Prize-winning professors like Oliver Smithies and Aziz Sancar. Notable Tar Heels include former President James Polk, actor Andy Griffith, and the famous basketball player Michael Jordan.
UNC’s undergraduate student population is around 20,000 students and is spread across eleven different schools and programs. The “IDEAs in Action General Education Curriculum” sets out the undergraduate courses that go beyond what’s needed for the 70 different majors at UNC. This basic curriculum requires first-year classes in understanding data, writing in English, and attending a Freshman seminar. Students also need to finish nine courses covering various areas like humanities and arts, maths and science, and social studies, as they work towards their bachelor’s degree.
After many years of being North Carolina’s main public university, UNC was shut down during the period after the Civil War known as Reconstruction. But by 1875, things were up and running again in Chapel Hill. In the 1900s, the university became important during the Civil Rights Movement. Students organised protests as part of the Sit-In campaign to integrate, and they fought for freedom of speech to make sure activist speakers weren’t silenced.
Today, UNC gets more than $500 million each year from the National Institutes of Health. It’s part of the Atlantic Coast Conference and runs the Morehead Cain merit scholarship program, which was the first of its kind in the United States. It’s located in Chapel Hill, a really nice college town. Some people call Chapel Hill a blue bubble in a sea of red because most folks here are liberal, even though North Carolina tends to be conservative overall.
Students at Chapel Hill University engage in many activities outside of their regular studies. They participate in writing for the student newspaper called The Daily Tar Heel, acting in the local theatre group known as the Playmakers Repertory Company, and joining fraternities or sororities to socialise. These groups make up a significant portion of the student body, about one-fifth.
In North Carolina, there’s a law that states 80% of students admitted to UNC must be from the state. For the Class of 2027, there were 56,427 applicants, but only 17% were accepted. Among these, 43.1% were from North Carolina and 8.2% were from out of state. The Morehead-Cain scholarship, which covers tuition and provides funding for summer research, has a very low acceptance rate of 3%.
The UNC Undergraduate Admissions Office says the toughest applicants are the ones who ‘like doing lots of different things well—or focus on just a couple.’ The Ivy Coach tells our students to go for the second option. Showing you’re really good at something specific can really boost your chances of getting into UNC!
