@Wake2020Parent @Holden2016 : The UNC System has enacted rules to increase enrollment of students from North Carolina counties that have low population and/or are economically distressed: “By fall 2021, increase enrollment of students from Tier 1 and Tier 2 counties by 11% over fall 2016 levels (an average of 2% per year) to reduce the existing participation gap by at least half.”
(Counties are placed in “tiers” as follows: “The N.C. Department of Commerce annually ranks the state’s 100 counties based on economic well-being and assigns each a Tier designation. The 40 most distressed counties are designated as Tier 1, the next 40 as Tier 2 and the 20 least distressed as Tier 3. A county automatically qualifies as Tier 1 if it has a population less than 12,000 people or if it has a population less than 50,000 and a poverty rate of 19 percent or greater. A county automatically qualifies as Tier 2 if it has a population less than 50,000.”)
https://www.northcarolina.edu/sites/default/files/unc_strategic_plan.pdf
So the OP’s oldest son may have gotten caught up in directed increase in admissions from rural/distressed counties; and it wouldn’t surprise me that this will come at the expense of students who live in urban/wealthier counties. Although it seems that something else was going on; perhaps the issue also is with essays/LORs, as some of the other posters have suggested; or a combination of those things. It is a bit of a surprising outcome for an in-state student with his stats and ECs.