The start of a new year Welcome home, Tar Heels

Tar Heels are back in town for the start of the 2019-20 school year and, with more than 7,000 new students strolling through campus, Carolina is buzzing again.

Celebrating new beginnings at Convocation

New Student Convocation marks the beginning of each school year. At this year’s ceremony, keynote speaker and Carolina’s legendary women’s soccer coach Anson Dorrance urged the newest Tar Heels — 4,195 first-year students and 852 transfer students — to attack their dreams and take advantage of everything offered at this Southern Park of Heaven.

This is our hope for you at Carolina: that you would learn to navigate the stars. … We want you to be ready so that whether you are an artist or a business leader, a lawyer or a doctor, a scientist or a historian, or even an astronaut, you can get where you need to go.

Interim Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz

Meet the new Tar Heels

The incoming first-year and transfer students were selected from a record number of applicants, and they represent the most geographically diverse and globally engaged group to enroll at Carolina.

Among the newest Tar Heels are 300 students with military affiliations, 218 international students and nearly 800 students who are the first in their families to pursue a bachelor’s degree.

Learn more about the new class

21%are first-generation college students
90%participated in community service
45%ranked within the top 10 students in their high school class
13%are Carolina Covenant Scholars
71%competed in a sport
21%founded an organization or started a business or non-profit

Week of Welcome

Explore more campus life stories

Making Carolina feel like home
With boxes and suitcases in tow, thousands of undergraduate students moved into their residence halls last weekend. The Tar Heels spent the following days getting to know the campus, making new friends and preparing for classes.
Kicking off the year at Convocation, FallFest
The new school year started with a party at the annual New Student Convocation and FallFest celebration. Hundreds of student organizations, volunteer groups, sports clubs and recreational league teams were stationed around Hooker Fields to welcome the Tar Heels home.
A welcome back
As the fall semester gets underway, Interim Chancellor Kevin Guskiewicz welcomes Tar Heels back to campus.
The magic of the Old Well
Campus was buzzing as students returned to classes this morning, but no place was more popular than the Old Well. Hundreds of students lined up along Cameron Avenue to take part in the decades-old tradition of the first sip.