Northeastern invests a record $511 million in financial aid, welcomes talented class on multiple campuses
Northeastern is investing a record $511 million in financial aid—not loans—for the 2025-2026 academic year and remains committed to meeting the full demonstrated financial need for every undergraduate student who attends the university.
Today, 60.2% of undergraduate students at the university receive financial aid, including merit scholarships and need-based grants.
This fall, Northeastern welcomed an academically talented freshman class from a record 105,283 applicants. Many of them chose Northeastern for its global experiential learning programs, research opportunities, and the opportunity to study on multiple campuses, according to Satyajit Dattagupta, chief enrollment officer, special advisor to the president and executive vice chancellor.
Dattagupta says 30% of this year’s first-year students applied to a combined major. Combined majors are hybrid degree programs that combine completely different academic fields, such as computer science and philosophy, or game design and sociology.
Families are also looking for a value proposition that gives their students an edge in the global job market upon graduation, Dattagupta says.
“Students and their families are laser-focused on return on investment,” says Dattagupta. “Northeastern answers that need better than any institution with its focus on academic excellence, groundbreaking research, global mobility, and experiential learning.”
Every year, students participate in Northeastern’s signature co-op program in 158 countries and all continents, including Antarctica. The real-world professional experience gained during co-op is integrated with classroom learning, exposing students to industries ranging from AI and tech to healthcare and public service. Students join small startups and global conglomerates, consumer brands, not-for-profits and NGOs, for six months at a time, graduating with up to 18 months of work experience by graduation.
Post-Graduation Employment Outcomes
Employment or Graduate School
Students employed full-time or enrolled in graduate programs within nine months of graduation
Jobs Related to Majors
Graduates employed in jobs related to their majors
Co-ops Turned Into Job Offers
Graduates who receive job offers from their previous co-op employers
As a result, 96% of undergraduate students are employed full time or in graduate school within nine months of graduation, and 93% of employed graduates are in jobs that are related to their majors. Fifty-eight percent of Northeastern graduates are offered a job from a previous co-op employer.
The university welcomed 2,735 first-year undergraduate students to its Boston campus this fall. An additional 727 first-year students joined at the Oakland campus, while 812 London Scholars began their undergraduate education in London. The inaugural class of 271 NYC Scholars are spending a year at Marymount Manhattan College in New York City before transferring to Northeastern’s Boston campus. (Northeastern and MMC announced a merger in 2024)
Additionally, 1,326 first-year students started their Northeastern experience by participating in the N.U.in program, spending their first semesters studying in France, Germany, Greece, the Czech Republic, Ireland, Northern Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Scotland or Spain.
Northeastern also offers regionally aligned graduate programs and research on its campuses in Arlington, Va.; Burlington, Mass.; Charlotte, NC; Miami; Nahant, Mass.; Portland, Maine; Seattle; Silicon Valley, Calif.; Toronto; and Vancouver, British Columbia.
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Academically talented class
While standardized test scores are not required for prospective first-year students, the average two-part SAT score for the Class of 2029 is 1480. This represents a 250-point jump from 2006, when the average score was 1230. The average high school GPA this year is 4.2.
Northeastern offers more than 304 combined majors, which encourage students to explore multiple academic fields through an integrated curriculum. In fact, 30% of this year’s first-year students applied to a combined major.
Students hail from around the world
The incoming class includes students from 97 countries, while the first-year students on the Boston campus alone represent 47 states and 75 countries. The total enrollment of international students—including F-1 visa holders and those on OPT—this fall is 25,042, compared with 25,580 in Fall 2024 and 23,298 in Fall 2023.
Co-op and experiential learning are more popular than ever
The university has a global network of more than 4,600 employer partners ranging from small local startups to large multinational corporations in every industry. Each year, more than 12,000 Northeastern students are hired for co-op positions around the world.
Experiential learning opportunities also include global experiences such as the faculty-led Dialogue of Civilizations program that takes students to multiple countries for several weeks at a time.
