The last stop on my North Carolina college tour was visiting Duke University, home of the fighting Blue Devils, and fierce rival of my morning visit, UNC-Chapel Hill. Duke is home to 6,800 undergrads and situated on an 8,600 acre campus, there is a lot of land to go around. Located a few miles from the downtown of Durham, now a hip and artistic innovation hub that has drawn many world-famous startups and tech heavyweights. I am going to break up my visit to Duke with fun facts about the university and then a second post specifically about Duke admissions, and insights from the helpful information session led by a Duke admissions officer. First, the fun!

Fun Facts about Duke

-Durham boasts the lowest gender wage gap of any city in the US, and is also the “geekiest city” and a big foodie city
-Duke emphasizes collaboration rather than competition between students, there’s an 8:1 student-faculty ratio and 70% classes are under 20 students
-The demographic breakdown of students is: North Carolina residents- 12%; international 14%, northeast 14%, Asian/Asian-American 25%, Caucasian 47%
-Duke has the top 5 research budget in the nation per capita
-The Duke admissions officer highlighted that Duke prides itself on Flexibility and Opportunity- 80% of students are enrolled in the College of Arts and Science, where there are 48 majors, 50 minors, and 20 certificates. The remaining 20% of students are enrolled in engineering
-A 98% retention rate means that 98/100 students who come to Duke decide to stay, that is very high!