DePaul University

DePaul is the largest Catholic university in the United States by enrolment, in the centre of Chicago, with more than 130 undergraduate programmes and students from 114 countries. It runs on a quarter calendar with four intakes a year — autumn, winter, spring and summer — which is an unusually large number of entry points and matters for a Kazakh applicant whose visa or documents slip past one deadline. DePaul is absolute in refusing to waive English proficiency on grounds of language of instruction, but pairs that with two named bridging routes and a conditional admission process, so a strong student with weak English has a defined path rather than a rejection. Because English re-testing happens at the end of every quarter, a conditionally admitted student can progress into academic classes sooner than at a semester university.