Potential UNC Wilmington students received admission decisions in as little as ten minutes at an open house held at the UNCW Onslow Extension campus on Thursday.

The open house at Camp Lejeune on Thursday was sparsely attended. At times, no students were there at all. It may have had something to do with the sign on the glass doors of the building reading, “TA Funding has been discontinued until further notice.”

The sign refers to tuition assistance, which paid for the classes and books for several students at the UNCW Extension Site. These benefits were suspended when the spending cuts caused by the sequestration went into effect.

“Because they just turned down the tuition assistance, it kind of put a damper on things, but we’re hoping things will pick up over at Coastal Carolina.” said Jill Fegley, the director of the Onslow County Extension Site and UNCW’s military student liaison, explaining the lack of students at the open house.

The open house was held in the morning at the John A. Lejeune Education Center on Camp Lejeune, and later in the afternoon on the Coastal Carolina Community College campus.

At the second half of the open house at CCCC, students turned out in greater numbers.

The Onslow Extension Site offers courses to locals at its Camp Lejeune location as well as on the campus of Coastal Carolina Community College. Students who applied by the day before the event and had official transcripts were able to pay the application fee and have their application reviewed on the spot for undergraduate programs both at the main campus and the extension site.

Outside the door of where the event was held, a group of four people who had just been accepted spoke about their experiences.

“I had to wait, like, five minutes,” said Melissa Wooten, the president of CCCC’s Student Government Association. She told her friend who had already applied, Bill Ragsdale, about the event and he decided to come at the last minute.

“I found out my letter got mailed yesterday,” Ragsdale said.

He is still uncertain about his future, though, because the degree in environmental studies that he wants is not available at the extension site. Out of the 52 bachelor’s degrees offered at UNCW, six are available at the extension site, as well as six of the 38 master’s degrees.

The unavailability of certain degrees motivates some students to drive from Onslow county to Wilmington multiple times a week rather than attend the extension sites. It’s a problem that the administration is aware of.

According to Fegley, the original degrees offered were based on what kind of jobs the community around Camp Lejeune had available.

“The program started out in 1995 with just elementary education,” Fegley explained. “It was really to address a need in the community for teachers in the local school districts.” Because of the frequent military related moves, there was a high rate of turnover for teachers. As the program has grown, they have included more degree options to address the need for other positions that are often held by military dependents, such as social workers and nurses.

Today, the degree programs are still developed based on community need, but they are also based on student interest. Fegley expects more degree options to be available at the extension site in the future.