The Class of 2025 Arrives on Campus

Duke’s class of 2025 – comprising 1,752 students from 48 states and 85 foreign countries – will arrive on campus Tuesday.

Slightly more than 55 percent of the class are women and 56 percent of the class identifies as students of color. Ten percent of the class are foreign nationals, and 10 percent arrive at Duke after having taken a gap year.

“This group of students have lived through an incredibly difficult 18 months,” said Christoph Guttentag, Duke’s dean of undergraduate admissions. “We noticed their resilience as we read their applications, but they’ve been through some real challenges, and I know that Duke will be ready to support them in this next phase of their lives. It was an unusually large, talented, and diverse pool, and I think this class will some very special qualities to the Duke community.”

More than 1,200 high schools and 900 cities and towns are represented in the class. Among U.S. states, the largest contingent of incoming students comes from North Carolina, followed by New York, California Florida, Virginia, and New Jersey.

New first-year students will arrive on Duke’s East Campus during designated two-hour windows. Along with unpacking, they will complete a COVID-19 entry test at Brodie Recreation Center, a requirement to ensure activation of their DukeCards.

Students will then enter the university’s COVID-19 surveillance testing program for the rest of the semester. More information on the testing programs is available on the Duke United website.

All faculty, students and staff are currently required to wear masks all the time while inside campus buildings.

Move-in kicks off a week of orientation events, including Undergraduate Convocation, which will be held at 11 a.m., Wednesday, Aug. 18. The event has been moved outdoors to Abele Quad on West Campus for public health reasons (weather permitting).

A note on traffic: Move-in day is expected to be hectic, with students arriving all day. Heavy traffic is expected on and around both East and West Campus starting at 7 a.m. and ending around 5 p.m.

Traffic control officers will be posted on both campuses, and only buses, emergency and other Duke vehicles will be able to access Towerview Road from Duke University Road for most of that day. All other traffic should enter campus via Erwin Road or the Science Drive/N.C. 751 entrance.

Duke's social media channels will post material from move-in day all day long. Check out the latest photos on Duke's Instagram account.