For years, it was information shared only in whispers. Undocumented students, bright and educated, wanted to go to college, and a precious few universities were willing, very quietly, to help them pay for it.

But as ferocious battles rage in Congress, statehouses and courtrooms over the legal status of undocumented immigrants, an evolution has been underway at some colleges and universities. They are taking it upon themselves to more freely, sometimes openly, make college more affordable for these students, for whom all federal and most state forms of financial aid remain off limits.

In recent years — and especially since 2012, when the Obama administration issued the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, an executive action that said undocumented immigrants who came to the United States as children could stay here for a period and legally work — leaders of these colleges appear increasingly comfortable treating undocumented students the same as they do citizens or legal residents.

“It’s been talked about more, and more openly, because of the existence of a legal status, DACA,” said Daniel R. Porterfield, president of Franklin and Marshall College in Pennsylvania, which recently started offering more financial aid to undocumented young people. “It now gives those students the legal right to be more out of the shadows than they had been when they were simply undocumented.”