It will drop to at least 20%, perhaps as low as 10%, depending on how generous Michigan’s FA becomes after this latest fund-raising campaign. As Michigan’s perceived exclusivity increases, the yield will continue to rise. This will be compounded further if Michigan meets those rare acceptances with generous FA.
@billcsho,
I get a similar estimated OOS admit rate using simpler assumptions. Assume the pool of Michigan HS grads is stable at about 100,000, the pool of in-state applicants is stable at about 10,000, and the in-state admit rate is stable at about 50%. That means roughly 5,000 in-state admits out of 13,577 total, leaving 8,577 OOS admits out of 41,760 OOS applicants. That’s a 20.54% OOS admit rate. Could be slightly higher if the number of in-state admits is lower, but I think we’re right around a 21% OOS admit rate in any case. Pretty darned selective.
@bclintonk I also use 10,000 in state applicants in the calculation as that has been pretty constant. The ~50% admission rate can be deduced from the 58% in state enrollment rate and ~75% in state yield rate. The in state admission rate is actually not stable. It also goes down in the past 10 years.
@bclinktonk i don’t think that necessarily translates 100% to quality of the students admitted in either category. Consider that only 10k out of 100k HS grads even apply. Why is this? Because the vast majority of the other 90k know they have no chance and won’t waste the time and $. In state seniors and guidance counselors have a better gauge on whether they can get admitted. OOS applicants are mostly extremely wealthy and don’t mind throwing $50 or whatever the app fee is at a long shot. I would bet quite a lot that thousands of OOS apps are not remotely qualified.
" I would bet quite a lot that thousands of OOS apps are not remotely qualified."
Yet the applications go up, the yield goes up, and the acceptance rate goes down. Clearly, some kids will buy the lottery ticket, but not sure about thousands not being remotely qualified.
steellord, OOS applicants tend to be academically oriented and highly qualified. Since it is not located in a popular area (like the Northeast or California), or known for being a party school, it is safe to say that Michigan attracts applicant who seek top ranked academics. You obviously have many applicants who apply for the heck of it, but for the most part, applicants will be academically gifted and intellectually switched on.
Well, sure. It’s also true at HYPS et al that some applicants—thousands, certainly—don’t have any real chance of being admitted. Yet the overall applicant pools at those schools are very strong, to the point that admissions officers say they could fill their entering class many times over with very well qualified applicants. I have no reason to think it’s much different at Michigan. Maybe not the part about filling the entering class many times over with well-qualified applicants, simply because Michigan’s entering class is so much bigger. But given where Michigan draws its OOS students—the Northeast, the Chicago area and California are heavily represented—I suspect there’s a fair amount of overlap between Michigan’s OOS applicant pool and that of elite privates, especially in the Northeast. And frankly, as Michigan’s acceptance rate continues to shrink, it becomes even more attractive to that pool of elite applicants.
Every year on CC you hear stories of bewildered OOS applicants with stellar stats who weren’t admitted to Michigan, and in some cases weren’t even waitlisted. Some made the mistake of thinking Michigan was their safety. As wiser heads explain to them, no one can reasonably think Michigan is their safety, because it’s so selective that many well qualified candidates won’t be admitted. That’s an indication there’s real strength in the applicant pool beyond those who are offered admission. You also hear lots of stories from admitted OOS applicants who can’t attend because they don’t get enough FA. Michigan plans to address this latter problem with its current $4 billion capital campaign, which will raise enough money to allow the university to meet full need for OOS students. Then, look out! Michigan’s yield will surge, its OOS admit rate will shrink even further, and it will appear even more prestigious to the nation’s top HS seniors, further strengthening the OOS applicant pool.
I don’t recall anyone ever saying the in-state admits are academically weaker just because the in-state admit rate is higher. I certainly never said that. It’s been well-known for years that Michigan’s in-state applicant pool is highly self-selective. Heck that was true even in my day, when dinosaurs roamed the earth. Only 2 people from my HS graduating class of about 120 in a small town in the UP applied to Michigan–the val (me) and the sal, and we were both admitted. Of the next-best students, a bunch applied to Michigan State and an even bigger bunch applied to Michigan Tech. It’s also clear if you look at the numbers that in contrast to states in the Northeast and even some Midwestern states like Illinois, relatively few Michigan HS grads apply to or attend elite private colleges and universities. There are some, to be sure, but most of the state’s top students apply to, are accepted at, and attend the University of Michigan. These are the same kids who, if they lived in New York or New Jersey, would be gunning for the top private colleges and universities and/or top OOS publics like Michigan and Virginia, because they’d perceive their own state’s flagship as not measuring up.
I don’t think this is accurate. I am from the northeast. People who apply from around here are among the most highly qualified candidates. Nearly everyone who applies to Yale and Harvard will apply to Michigan as a “safety.” Looking at our school’s Naviance, the average stats of UMich applicants is significantly higher than the average stats for accepted students, even for OOS.
80% of OOS applicants got rejected not because they are mostly underqualified.
^^^Exactly. My D’s guidance counselor said that from OOS it is important to show that UMich is a top choice so that they don’t mess up their yield numbers.
Many OOS applicants who view Michigan as a “safety” get rejected. It’s not just a question of yield management. Unlike many public universities, Michigan uses a holistic admissions process; it’s not just a mechanical, sort-by-numbers process. Among other things, they want students who will be happy and excited to be there. Anyone who gives off signals that they’d really rather be elsewhere and would attend Michigan only as a last resort is just not a good fit, in my opinion. And they have plenty of well qualified OOS applicants to choose from, so those who appear least likely to attend, or least want to attend, are going to go to the bottom of the pile.
I also think many GCs in the Northeast don’t realize how selective Michigan has become, and give poor advice as a consequence. There was a time when top applicants could think of Michigan as a “safety”—just as there was a time when applicants to Harvard could realistically view Brown as a “safety.” Those days are long since past. Michigan’s OOS admit rate is now barely above 20%. Once you get into that range, a school is not a “safety” for anyone. Period. No doubt some of those GCs wrongly advising their students to use Michigan as a “safety” face a rude surprise when those students are rejected, and so they attribute the rejection to “yield management.” Not so. It’s just that many applicants with similar stats now get rejected. Same as at Harvard or Brown.
That is correct bclintonk, which is why I think brantly wrote “safety” rather than safety. Students underestimate Michigan’s selectivity, as do parents and misguided GCs. But it is clear at this point that no OOS applicant can consider Michigan a safety, or even a target. Admit rates for OOS and international students are now under 20%, with typical ACT/SAT ranges similar to those of Cornell, Brown, Georgetown etc…
“Among other things, they want students who will be happy and excited to be there. Anyone who gives off signals that they’d really rather be elsewhere and would attend Michigan only as a last resort is just not a good fit, in my opinion.”
The above is the most important part of your post: the 97% retention rate suggests that the university understands the need for “fit” and acts accordingly. While there are many aspects of the admissions process which might be improved, the university excels at “fit”. To that extent, one wonders if the improvable aspects of the process are sacrificed in the search for fit.
While a good number of kids had to unexpectedly wait for admission this year our Naviance “safety line” held. Students above a certain GPA/ACT combo have never been rejected in our history of keeping stats and they weren’t this year in the end. We have a few things going for us. Michigan knows our OOS school well , has a good relationship with college counselors at the school and knows 1) students who attend are likely to be well prepared and 2) our town has a history of producing loyal Large donation alums
However as michigan selectivity continues to increase our CGC is increasingly concerned that in the future she may not be able to even tell those " above the line" that they have UMich as a safety.
^ It really depends on where the line is drawn. The OOS admission has dropped from 27% to 20% or below while the trend continue. It is inevitably that the GC of any school needs to keep up with the increase in competitiveness at UMich and many other top schools too.
I have read all the posts! My observation :
OOS students applying to Michigan, include, very bright students with stellar academic credential. The same set also apply to Ivy league and top privates. Yes, there is a perception that Michigan is easier to get vis-a-vis top private and Ivy like Northwestern and Cornell. I mentioned these two as most of the applicants who apply to Cornell and Northwestern also apply to Michigan. It may take a couple of years more to change the perception!
A large number of very bright OOS avoid applying to Michigan due to the Cost factor and as rightly pointed out, a good aid package to deserving OOS will increase the number of applicants quite sharply! In my opinion, if the aid is linked directly to merit, instead of need,then the quality part will be assured.
In my opinion, Michigan needs to alter its image that it is a 'huge place" more focused on research/graduate studies and undergrads get less attention from the faculty! This I keep hearing even from the alumni as well as from the current students. It could as well be a fact! You can't change the size, but you can always change the way you address faculty student interaction and pay extra attention to the entering class at the undergraduate level. If the entering class is happy then it helps to change the perception faster!
All the top universities, Ivy included, plan a lot on "Yield Management". Since it is an important marketing tool, aimed towards parents as well, let Michigan do it within the same set of principles!
In my opinion, Michigan is rated very high by both the east and west coast schools. I am pretty sure that the number of OOS applying to Michigan will see a major upward trend in the next year.
“If the entering class is happy then it helps to change the perception faster!”
I would say that with 97% of Freshman returning for their 2nd year, they must be happy. The school spirit is as high as anywhere. Now maybe Admissions can leverage the Freshman retention rate/satisfaction further, but it is evident.
To easily increase yield, just play the ED game like so many privates already do.
^ That’s a good point about ED, rjk. In 2014, based on data from its 2014-15 Common Data Set, Northwestern filled somewhere upwards of 40% of its entering class with ED. It had 2,625 ED applicants and admitted 926 of them (35.3% ED admit rate). If it had 100% yield among the EDs, they’d represent 45.3% of the entering class of 2,043, but you can’t assume 100% yield because some may have opted out due to insufficient FA. Even if 10% of the ED admits didn’t enroll, however, the EDs would still represent over 40% of the entering class.
That allows you to be even more selective in the RD round. Northwestern had 33,673 applicants overall, and 4,415 admits for a 13.1% admit rate overall. Subtracting out the ED applicants and ED admits, that means it had 31,048 RD applicants and 3,489 RD admits, for an RD admit rate of 11.2%. A 100% yield on ED admits would mean it needed to fill only 1,117 seats from the RD pool, so it needed only a 32% yield from its RD admits to get there. (Of course, the actual ED yield was less than 100%, so the RD yield must have been somewhat higher than 32%, perhaps as much as 35%, but the basic relationship holds.) But here’s the key point: Northwestern’s overall yield was 46.3%, a fairly impressive figure; but it was that high only because ED was doing so much of the heavy lifting.
ED can also have a pretty big impact on your overall admit rate. It may not seem like that because Northwestern’s RD admit rate was 11.2% and that’s pretty close to its overall admit rate of 13.1%. But both the RD and overall admit rates are as low as they are in part because of ED. Suppose Northwestern had no ED, only RD, and it had the same 35% yield. Then to fill 2,043 seats it would need to admit 5,837, or 17.3% of its 33,673 applicants. A 17.3% admit rate is still pretty darned impressive, but not as impressive as the 13.1% Northwestern was able to achieve through aggressive use of ED. Yield management requires finding and offering admission to those students who are most determined to enroll if given the chance, and ED is a terrifically efficient way to find them. Or as I like to say, nothing says to a college “I love you!” quite so much as that ED application.
I don’t think Michigan will be in a position to go to ED until it’s meeting 100% of need for OOS students and word has gotten around that you don’t need to worry about FA because the school will take care of you. Even then, though, I’d expect the ED pool to skew more affluent than the RD pool because most OOS applicants with financial need are going to want to shop around for FA offers. Full-pays don’t need to worry about that.
Rintu, I agree with all four of your points. I believe that in the case of point #3, you have a situation where perception and anticipation become reality.
Students who go to schools like the Ivy League schools (and other elite private universities) have no negative perceptions before arriving on campus. They envision those universities to be perfect, and therefore, for the most part, students will accept whatever scenario gladly as a confirmation of their perceptions.
Students who go to Michigan have already been conditioned to believe, whether by their parents, GCs or impressionable fellow students, that it is just a public university, that they will be taught by GSIs in auditoriums filled with 400+ students. With that in mind, many of their preconceived notions will be confirmed.
In both cases, the reality is far from the perception. Most major research universities are going to have large intro-level classes and large classes in popular majors, copious GSI involvement and a generally uncaring faculty. Those institutions with top ranked graduate programs and award-winning faculties aren’t going to provide a LACish experience. There is a tradeoff.