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• 1st among the 100 U.S. public colleges and universities that offers students high-quality academics at an affordable price as ranked by Kiplinger’s Personal Finance magazine. 1st 11 consecutive times since Kiplinger’s began its periodic ranking in 1998. In 2011, the ranking was for both North Carolina and out-of-state students. Kiplinger’s changed its methodology to more strongly emphasize value because of the economic challenges facing higher education. For academics, the formula considered the percentage of students returning as sophomores and the four-year graduation rate. The magazine also favored campuses with low sticker prices and abundant financial aid, with bonus points for schools that keep student borrowing low. Carolina stands out in all of these categories.
  
  
• 43rd among the world’s top 400 universities in 2011-2012, according to the London-based Times Higher Education magazine.  Based on 13 separate performance indicators designed to capture the full range of university activities, from teaching to research to knowledge transfer. Those indicators cover teaching, research, citations, industry income and international outlook.
  
  
• Since the U.S. Rhodes Scholar program began in 1904, 47 Carolina students have been selected. In the past 25 years, Carolina has produced more Rhodes Scholars than any other national public research university. Among all research universities, the University ranks fifth for the most winners in the last five years, behind only Harvard, Yale, Stanford and Princeton.
  
  
• The Carolina Covenant serves as a national model for providing a debt-free education to qualified low-income students. More than 90 universities nationwide have followed Carolina’s lead since 2003. The most recent report card assessing the program shows the Carolina Covenant helps close the gap for earning degrees between low-income and other students. The University compared Covenant Scholars who enrolled in 2005 with a group of 2003 entering students who would have qualified. By several measures, Covenant students performed better than the comparison group and close or equal to the mark for all students.

• In fall 2011, Carolina enrolled 4,026 first-year students from a record 23,753 applications. Eighty percent graduated in the top 10 percent of their high school class, and they posted an average 1300 on the SAT. Eighteen percent were first-generation college students; another 12 percent were eligible for the Carolina Covenant. In all, Carolina enrolled 18,579 undergraduates. Total enrollment is currently 29,137.
  

• Oliver Smithies, Excellence Professor of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, received the 2007 Nobel Prize for work that has fundamentally changed the science of genetic medicine and potentially will help millions of people live healthier lives.
  
  
• Faculty attracted more than $788 million in total research grants and contracts in fiscal 2011, far exceeding the comparable figure from the previous year — $677 million — after excluding the $126 million in federal stimulus funding, which since has expired. The research is helping to cure diseases and produce new knowledge to help people.The steady growth of research funding over the past 15 years is a great tribute to the success of the faculty and a multidisciplinary approach to advancing knowledge and science.
  
  
• The journal Science, published by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, named an UNC-led HIV prevention study the 2011 Breakthrough of the Year. Professor Myron Cohen led the international study, which journal editors say “galvanized efforts to end the world’s AIDS epidemic in a way that would have been inconceivable even a year ago.” The study, conducted in multiple countries, evaluated whether antiretroviral drugs can prevent sexual transmission of HIV among couples in which one partner has HIV and the other does not. The research found that early treatment with antiretroviral therapy reduced HIV transmission in couples by at least 96 percent. The study provided proof of a concept developed at UNC more than 20 years in the making.
  

• The state’s only public cancer hospital is the $180 million North Carolina Cancer Hospital, part of the UNC Health Care System and the clinical home of the UNC Lineberger Comprehensive Cancer Center. The new facility, funded by the North Carolina General Assembly, tripled the previous patient care space and significantly increased the number of patients that can be served.
  
  
• At Carolina, one is a powerful number. One person’s work can reach thousands across North Carolina. Every day, Carolina people are helping North Carolinians. Take Howard McLeod. A professor and researcher in the Eshelman School of Pharmacy, McLeod directs the UNC Institute for Pharmacogenomics – the study of how people’s genes affect how they respond to drug therapies. His work, based on clinical trials with North Carolina breast cancer patients, led to a new way of prescribing tamoxifen. His research directly affects the lives of more than 3,000 people a year across North Carolina – and exponentially more around the country. For more examples, see one.unc.edu.
  
  
• Even before the economic downturn, Carolina launched a Bain & Company study that resulted in Carolina Counts, a campuswide initiative to make our operations more efficient. UNC was the first major university to undertake such an initiative, and other prominent universities, including Berkeley and Cornell, have followed that lead. By fall 2011, Carolina Counts had identified and implemented $50 million in permanent administrative savings. The goal is to reduce overlap in administrative functions, streamline operations and simplify unnecessary bureaucracy, thereby refocusing resources on the academic mission of the university. Given repeated reductions in state funding, Carolina Counts has also served as a roadmap to help wisely implement budget reductions.
  
  
• The Carolina First Campaign ended in 2007 after raising $2.38 billion, the fifth largest total among completed campaigns at that time in the history of U.S. higher education and the largest at a university in the South. It was the most successful fundraising effort in University history. Fundraising brought in $277 million in gifts from private donors in fiscal 2011. In commitments for the fiscal year, which ended June 30, the University secured $305.6 million. Commitments include pledges as well as gifts. Both totals were up from the previous fiscal year. Gifts rose 3.3 percent, from $268.1 million, and commitments increased 5 percent, from $292 million.
  
  
• A $3.63 million gift from The Blackstone Charitable Foundation of New York City will create the Blackstone Entrepreneurs Network, a five-year initiative to help North Carolina's Research Triangle become headquarters for America's next high-growth companies with the greatest potential to create new jobs. Carolina is joining partner schools Duke University, North Carolina Central University and North Carolina State University, as well as the Durham-based Council for Entrepreneurial Development, in the effort. The program will draw from the ranks of veteran master entrepreneurs to identify marketable innovations out of area universities and regional start-ups with the greatest potential to become high-growth companies, and then help them get started.
  
  
• The Carolina First Campaign’s success more than made good on former Chancellor James Moeser’s pledge in 2000 to triple the investment North Carolinians made by approving the Higher Education Bond Referendum, which brought $515 million for new buildings and renovations. The University invested its own funds (including private gifts and money through faculty research grants) to carry out one of the nation’s largest campus building programs valued at about $2.3 billion.

Updated January 2012