What is Direct Admission?

If you have a high school junior or senior they might have recently received an email from a direct admit school, saying they were admitted without applying. Direct admit is a relatively new process in college admissions where a student receives admission without going through the traditional application and standardized testing process. The student receives an email with an acceptance letter which usually also includes financial aid information as well. It’s a similar process to getting pre-approved for a credit card or loan.

There are a few programs that curently use direct admission including the Common Application (Common App) and Concourse.

Concourse requires a fee ($75) that can be waived but students create a profile which must be certified by a teacher, guidance counselor or another school representative. The profile needs to contain information such as GPA, college interests, test scores and location. Then Concourse will ‘match’ the student with universities that fit their criteria.

The Common App started a direct admit program a few years ago and continually add more and more schools to the program each year. Students who completed their Common App profile but did not submit had their information sent to participating schools. Six schools participated in the Common App direct admit program in 2021 and 14 did so in 2022 and it’s growing each year.

This information is constantly changing so check out the program you are interested in to find out more details!