Baylor's Future

Colleges and Universities A-Z Baylor University
1

<p>I received a message after my thread about being rejected from Baylor. For those of you who did not read this, I had a 26 ACT and was rejected from Baylor and the reason why was because they said it is becoming much more competitive this year.</p>

<p>A person told me the following- Baylor’s rank is increasing more and more as each year passes, with the ultimate goal of ranking among the top schools in the nation by 2030, which from what I heard from others is in the top 25. Although this seems like a long shot now, it will be well worth it, as 20 years is their ultimate goal, which will put them among the best. However, each year from here on out they will continue improving.</p>

<p>They have several Harvard, Yale, Stanford, Notre Dame, Duke, Johns Hopkins, Washington University, etc faculty. They have received a record number of applications this year, already being 30,000 and increasing daily. They are reducing student size, primarily only admitting students that are better qualified, which is top 10% of class and a 27 on the ACT exam. They have recently built a 200 million dollar science building which they have received much recognition for from some of the top colleges that focus on sciences and medical related fields. They are in the process of creating a Bachelor to Medical School program with some of the best medical schools in the nation, with one offer already. With such an amazing science building, faculty, and resources Baylor is a feeder program into medical school.</p>

<p>They are also creating a pre-law program which will offer admission to their law school if qualified, which is ranked 55th nationally, has the highest bar passage rate in Texas, and the number 1 trial program in the nation. Their accounting program is one of the best in the country, ranking 3rd highest in CPA Exam pass rates. Their undergraduate entrepreneurship program is ranked second in the nation. Their business school building is incredible, with great networking opportunities.</p>

<p>They just appoined Ken Starr as president of the university. For those of you not familiar with him, he is an Ivy League graduate and the man that prosecuted President Bill Clinton. He was the former Dean of Pepperdine Law School.</p>

<p>Most of the dorms are new and extremely nice. Unlike many colleges, Baylor has a campus feel and is like its own community. It has a very tight knit student body. There are many successful alumni, including the CEO of Hewlett Packard. Their endowment is over 1.3 billion dollars, and they recently received two alumni donations, one for 200 million, and the other for 25 million.</p>

<p>Their athletic programs are becoming much better, with their Men’s basketball program making the Elite 8 last year, losing to Duke.</p>

<p>If you don’t think this will happen, just look at the University of Miami, going from the 80’s to 47 over a few years with a large part attributed to their medical school.</p>

<p>It is the best deal for tuition, since they are increasing it more and more every year.</p>

2

<p>The scholarship is not in par with Harvard or Yale. I got only $15K in scholarship and I am expected to pay $24K per year from my pocket. Harvard or Yale expects me to pay only 10% of my arents’ income which is lot sweeter than Baylor. I may consider the Med school but not the undergradaute. Too expensive.</p>

3

<p>It’s all about money. Money to buy top faculty. Money to give enough merit award and need-based financial aid to attract the highest caliber student. Take a look at USC, which 20 years ago was ranked somewhere around where Baylor is today … somewhere in the 50-100 range. USC’s median GPA has gone over those 20 years from something like 3.3 unweighted to about 3.8 unweighted. Its 25/75 ave. SAT scores have gone from about 1175 to about 1375 in the same period. Why? Generous merit scholarships and generous need-based aid, which come from generous alumni and other donors.</p>

<p>As Baylor continues to be generous with Merit Awards (which makes Tuition/Fees/Room/Board around $26,000 for anyone scoring above 1250 on the SAT and top 25% of HS class), and if they in turn become more generous with supplemental need-based aid, there is no reason it won’t follow the same path over 2o years that USC has. USC is currently a “100% need” school, and Baylor is not, as respects need-based aid.</p>

<p>Notice in this archived article that in 1990, matriculants into USC were way down. The reason?-- lousy financial aid. They fixed that and have been on an upward trajectory since then. <a href=“USC Freshman Enrollment Starts Semester Down 18%”>USC Freshman Enrollment Starts Semester Down 18%;

4

<p>No offense, but the first post sounds like a glossy mail out. How good is Baylor? Where are their grads going?</p>