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Dave Best Pic (12222)by Dave Best

Colleges strive to be diverse. As an applicant, you can benefit from a boost in admissions if you are willing to look at schools outside your home region. Colleges value all types of diversity, including geographic.

Students often have low cost instate college options. But colleges have a goal of recruiting a diverse freshman class. To help recruit students from across the country, many schools have added admissions representatives to cover new regions of the country important for them. Plus, they have ramped up marketing to recruit students from target markets. This can present outstanding opportunities for qualified students, athletes and artists to land at solid programs outside their home region.

Highly-qualified students may be more willing to travel for the right school. Especially if that school shares a mutual interest to recruit them or entice them to attend. Students from small states that are significantly underrepresented (or not represented) for a college could have preference in admissions, having their financial need met, and perhaps earn merit scholarships if applicable. Examples include students from tropical areas willing to venture to colleges in the frozen tundra of the Midwest, or perhaps Midwestern kids open to schools in the Southwest. Please note that the most popular schools typically have a solid number of students from California, New York, Texas, Florida and other large states, so there usually is not an admissions bounce from those states.

Colleges publish their freshman class profiles and fact books that share their geographical diversity. Some highlight a US map and fill in the number of students enrolled by state. Others provide the number of students from instate as well as nearby states and perhaps other top states. Many highlight a count of how many states their freshman class comes from.

Diversity enhances education in many ways, including promoting creative thinking and providing different perspectives in the classroom and across the campus. Diversity can help prepare students for life and employment.

Here are some examples of some highly regarded schools across the country that have a large concentration of students from nearby states. All can possibly provide special admissions opportunities for students from outside that region.

Northeast

Lehigh University

Bethlehem, PA

ABE Airport 6.6 miles away

24% instate

62% from Pennsylvania + New Jersey + New York

US News Rank 44 National

Just announced plans to add 1,000 undergraduates to increase diversity (including geographic)

Southeast

University of Alabama

Tuscaloosa, AL

Birmingham Airport 60 miles away

43% instate

54% from Alabama + Georgia + Florida

US News Rank 103 National

Actively recruiting OOS with automatic merit scholarships based on test scores and grades

Southwest

Trinity University

San Antonio, TX

San Antonio International Airport 6 miles away

76% instate

79% from Texas + New Mexico + Arizona

US News Rank 1, Regional (West)

Midwest

Marquette University

Milwaukee, WI

General Mitchell International Airport 8 miles away

30% instate

69% from Wisconsin + Illinois

US News Rank 86 National

West

Pepperdine University

Malibu, CA

Los Angeles International Airport 30 miles away

50% instate

55% from California + Oregon + Washington

US News Rank 50 National