I was just perusing the most recent admissions stats available for UA on the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) website and thought I’d share the information. This is for the class admitted for Fall 2014.
Not too shabby and they certainly can hold their own (especially at the 75th percentile) against the competition both in-state and beyond.
I’ll post the stats for a few other universities so folks have something to compare it to, but if there’s a school in particular you’re looking for, just ask and I’ll add it here. Or feel free to do your owning searching: http://profiles.asee.org/
(And thanks to @aeromom for sharing the link to the ASEE site several years ago–it’s a tremendous resource I don’t think I would have discovered on my own!)
I was surprised that the math mid-range for UA engineers was lower than the composite mid-range. I always assume that engineering types are math whizzes. I guess the engineering students at UA are well rounded!
Very interesting info ! UA should send this to every guidance counselor in the state. Auburn is no longer the most popular destination in Alabama for the top engineering undergrads.
Good data comparison. @“beth’s mom” , the lower math relative to the composite score might be related to Alabama’s overall acceptance criteria vs other school’s individual engineering school requirements, not the university’s? UA will want to favorably compare with Georgia Tech and UT–two of the top 5 or 6 engineering schools nationally.
Great stuff! However, keep in mind that many colleges have different admission requirements/biases.
UA awards (via merit scholarships) high ACT composite scores, so the top 25 percentile tends to be high (even higher than the math scores).
The Texas schools put much more weight on being in the top 10% (7 or 8%) first, before looking at other metrics. That’s why 99% or 97% of the freshman are in the top 25 percentile of their high school graduating class.
UF buts more weight on GPA and ECs (with it’s holistic admissions) and much less on test scores. So the overall group of freshman have 96% in the top quarter of their high school graduating class, and 95% of the freshman class have a 3.75+ GPA. While low test scores can be countered by good EC’s.
Since Georgia Tech recruits a lot of OOS and international students (46% are OOS/international), it puts a lot of weight behind Test scores and class rigor (AP classes, etc.). Yes, they use holistic admissions, but that still secondary to test scores. Combine that with GT’s spike in popularity as the “OOS Engineering School”, you end up with very high test scores.
Ultimately, it does. However, over the next few years, it’s comparing itself to other solid engineering programs in the southeast, such as Auburn, Clemson, and UT-Knoxville. That’s why you’ll see a new focus on building up it’s grad program and increasing research (and recruiting faculty). UA has the students and facilities, now it needs to build up it’s faculty, grad programs and research (which are all linked).
All of which takes time. UA doesn’t just want to be a great engineering school, it wants to be a great comprehensive university. Other areas will also be getting attention (funding and support).
Thanks for your insights, @Gator88NE. I actually considered sending the draft of my OP to you last night to get some feedback and interpretation before posting, but the Super Bowl was about to start and I didn’t want to put that on you at that moment!
And I forgot to look up Tennessee, but here’s their stats:
@LucieTheLakie How do you get the screenshots to post? I have looked at these stats many times and UA compares very favorably to some of the Midwest highly regarded schools. Here is a snapshot:
One other note. I think these are the stats for 2015 entering class. The reason I say that is the UMN numbers are what they publish on the Common Data Set.
Just for reference UA was at 24 - 31 in 2010. A huge increase in five years!!
FWIW, I just cut and pasted the info from the “New Applicants” page for each college into a Word document and then cleaned them up before quoting them here. I should add that I tried to standardize them as much as possible, so they’re not “pure” quotations if you will.
My Word document is now about 72 pages long! I started with SE schools, and then went down the rabbit hole looking at schools my son applied to, and then on from there.
