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Applying for college is stressful for many students, especially when you add the anxiety over how to pay for it. What if all of that went away and colleges applied to you? Well, that's what some schools are doing, with an approach called direct admissions. From member station GBH, Kirk Carapezza reports.
KIRK CARAPEZZA, BYLINE: Ndilei Lukulay's mother came to the U.S. from Sierra Leone. Growing up in Springfield, Massachusetts, Lukulay felt nervous about applying to college.
NDILEI LUKULAY: I didn't know where to start and I was very stressed out about the whole thing.
CARAPEZZA: Then she saw the sticker prices.
LUKULAY: When you see the prices going up until, like, the six-figure range for the total of, like, four years, I was like, I don't know how I'm going to be able to pay that off.
CARAPEZZA: So when Western New England University in her hometown emailed to offer her automatic admission and a scholarship before she submitted her application, she was skeptical.
LUKULAY: So I was, like, is this a scam? Is this real?
CARAPEZZA: It was real. Western New England - a private university with more than 2,000 students - offered to admit her and more than 2,000 other students before they applied. This is direct admissions. The college tells students they'd be in based on a handful of criteria like their GPA or intended major. Imagine skipping essays, interviews and recommendations.
LUKULAY: I just never heard anything about it and I was like, it's that easy? They already got back to me?
CARAPEZZA: Direct admissions is now used by at least 10 schools here in Massachusetts and some public state systems across the country, including campuses in California, Idaho, Georgia and Minnesota. The practice is picking up steam with widespread concerns about the value of a degree and fewer high school grads going straight to college.
ANGEL PEREZ: The movement is growing.
CARAPEZZA: That's Angel Perez, CEO of the National Association for College Admission Counseling. He says direct admissions simplifies the complex application process.
PEREZ: And the way to ensure that we have more students in the pipeline to higher education is by removing some of the barriers.
CARAPEZZA: With a record number - at least 16 - nonprofit colleges closing this year, the urgency is real. Luke Skurman is the CEO of Niche, which helps colleges adopt direct admissions to fill their seats.
LUKE SKURMAN: Frankly, there is more supply than demand.
CARAPEZZA: In other words, there are more seats than students. And Skurman says Gen Z students crave transparency and immediacy.
SKURMAN: This is a generation that's used to Uber to show up at their doorstep and not wait six to nine months for an admissions acceptance letter.
CARAPEZZA: Direct admissions is a way of putting families in the driver's seat, but does it boost enrollment? Sometimes, says Jennifer Delaney.
JENNIFER DELANEY: It's not always able to move the needle on the enrollment side of things.
CARAPEZZA: Delaney teaches higher ed policy at the University of California-Berkeley. She studied Idaho's direct admissions program, which was the first in the nation back in 2015. There she found direct admissions helped to increase full-time undergrad enrollment by at least 4%, and it boosted in-state enrollment by at least 8%.
DELANEY: Having a bird in the hand in Idaho meant that you stayed in Idaho for school, and you didn't go out of state.
CARAPEZZA: But what about low-income students?
DELANEY: Admissions isn't enough. You've got to be admitted and be able to pay for it.
CARAPEZZA: That's why more schools are adding direct financial aid offers, too.
(SOUNDBITE OF STUDENTS PLAYING PINGPONG)
CARAPEZZA: In the student center at Western New England University, students are playing pingpong and shooting pool. Freshman Marykate Agnes says she was admitted through direct admissions and got financial aid. She's one of more than 200 students here who accepted the offer.
MARYKATE AGNES: I think that it's just an awesome thing, and it takes stress off of the students.
CARAPEZZA: Agnes says she doesn't worry about attending a less selective school and that her work is more rigorous than some of her friends at better-known colleges. It's not about where you go, she says, but how you go to college.
For NPR News, I'm Kirk Carapezza.
(SOUNDBITE OF MOSS OF AURA'S "WHEELS") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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