<p>Why does it seem like Duke University admits less Hispanic students than its peers? For the Class of 2016, 7% of those admitted were Hispanic. Some other examples of upper-tier universities:</p>
<p>Stanford University: 14%
Cornell: 12%
Harvard: 11%
Brown: 12%
Columbia: 15%
UPenn: 10%
Princeton: 8%</p>
<p>US population that is of Hispanic/Latino origin: 16.7%</p>
<p>Certainly Duke can't be struggling to find qualified Hispanic applicants compared to these other Universities?</p>
<p>I would say probably Duke hasn’t spent as much effort recruiting Hispanics as other schools or even compared with recruiting African-American students.</p>
<p>7% isn’t really too different from Princeton’s 8%. I know that the hispanic community on campus is very tight knit and that Duke is making an effort to admit a more diverse class this year.
I wouldn’t worry too much about the size of the hispanic contingent at Duke. A smaller contingent is usually a more intimate one, and having fewer hispanics could conceivably encourage hispanic students to mingle more with the other students on campus. After all, college should be about breaking out of your comfort zone! :)</p>
<p>It could also have something to do with Duke’s location in the South. Although, I would pay no heed to outdated stereotypes of the South if I were you. Durham is a very progressive and racially diverse community, and the research triangle area is one of the fastest growing regions in the country.</p>
<p>There might be another dynamic operating here that results in lower Latino students on campus. It might be that Duke offers a high percentage of qualified Latino students but a lower proportion of them decide to matriculate at Duke because they prefer the Ivy League? It might be a brand name recognition gap that Duke is working to close.</p>
<p>It may also be a financial gap. Some of the other schools meet full need without loans while Duke does not. They have some outstanding merit programs but there are only a few from the thousands admitted that benefit from that. Just a thought.</p>
<p>OP, keep in mind that the disparity in financial aid and brand name only apply with respect to the top 3 ivies.
Duke is very much on par with (and arguably even ahead of) the rest of the ivy league in terms of the aforementioned criteria.</p>
<p>If what carimama says is correct and Duke does not meet full need that would explain a lot. Being Hispanic I would say, speaking for myself, there is no way I’d be able to afford Duke.</p>
<p>Duke is need-blind and meets 100% of demonstrated need (FYI)… They provide a financial aid package that largely revolves around your EFC calculated on the Fafsa, and then provide very limited loans, work study, and large “need-based scholarships” (essentially grants).</p>
<p>In fact, of students who apply for aid, I believe the average grant amount awarded is like 38k, while the average loan requirement is only 3.5k.</p>
<p>However, Duke does first max out on loans and work-study before giving grant money. Since loans are typically 4-5k a year and work study is about 2k, students who are on FA are expected to work and (if they have no outside scholarships) are expected to graduate with around 20k in debt. While this may seem small in comparison to six-figure debtloads that are commonplace, it is still something compared to the debt-free packages from Penn and Princeton. Duke would be hard-pressed to compete with that.</p>
<p>Yes, that’s what I understood. They max out loans first and if my D can graduate without loans that would be ideal. If I could have helped her more I would have. </p>
<p>We’ll see what the FA letters look like when they arrive.</p>
<p>The “semi-good” news is that it usually only takes about 5k a year of outside funds to cancel out the loans since they are the first to go. But even that could be hard sometimes.</p>