<p>Of course, but it doesn’t. As I said in some of my initial posts, NU and NDame have patterns similar to the Ivies insofar as development is around 200 in home region, average in another region, below in the remaining regions. </p>
<p>It’s like there’s almost a reluctance to acknowledge that the numbers, to some extent, reflect choices. </p>
<p>U of Chicago and Northwestern are research universities that are in the same city and have generally similarly qualified student bodies. Yet U of Chicago has a more nationally rep student body. Discuss. </p>
<p>(I guarantee that in THIS discussion, a more nationally representative student body will be seen as evidence of quality, reputation, prestige, etc,) </p>
<p>I probably prefer NU’s model though. They take a lot more kids from Texas. :)</p>
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<p>I have no doubt that prestige has something to do with it, but also ED/EA. NU now takes nearly half of its class during the ED round.</p>
<p>Want me to throw in a good word for texaspgkid?! Lol </p>
<p>Why would that make the student body more Midwestern? </p>
<p>Many local kids apply ED because that is where they want to go and they can’t change their mind later?</p>
<p>I think the University of Chicago also did a national marketing campaign about 10 years ago. It was the only school that geographically distant from us that sent mailings to my S. As for the NU question, I have often wondered if part of the name recognition of schools is significantly enhanced by a school name that contains a specific state or city. Northwestern sounds like it could be in Washington State by the name, if you didn’t know it wasn’t. There would be no doubt where the Univ. of Chicago is, and there shouldn’t be any doubt where WUSTL is either. As an example, I actually have never met anyone from the state of New Mexico, nor do I know anyone who has attended school in New Mexico, nor have I seen a discussion that included the University of New Mexico on these boards, and I know not one thing about the school. Yet if someone were to suddenly ask me if I had ever heard of the University of New Mexico, without thinking I would say yes. After all, practically everyone knows the names of the states and the big cities in the US. This theory also explains why NYU is on the dream school list above some higher ranked schools; New York City is arguably the most famous city in the country. </p>
<p>PG:
"It’s like there’s almost a reluctance to acknowledge that the numbers, to some extent, reflect choices. "</p>
<p>I agree with this, but I think you have to go further. It’s not just the choices of the applicants, it’s also the choices of the schools themselves. A very attractive school like Princeton gets applicants from all over. They reject nearly 95% of all those applicants. Common sense tells me that they probably reject nearly 95% of the applicants from every region. Perhaps it’s only 90% that they reject from the midwest (because that’s what they choose to do), but it’s a big number. So for some reason Princeton is rejecting a giant number of kids from midwest when they could decide to accept 15% or 20% from there and even things out. Why don’t they? They choose not to because there are looking for other characteristics they deem more important. They are more interested in the individual applicants themselves than to try to get a mass of students that match a particular ratio of population.</p>
<p>It’s been said here that schools like Princeton aren’t doing a good enough job attracting these students in underrepresented regions. But there are quite a few of students from the midwest that don’t care for Princeton. They want to attend U of Chicago or WashU or some other great school closer to them. Should Princeton try harder to convince these students to not be so “regional”? Is it worth that effort?</p>
<p>Huh. Is that the case for all the Ivies that have the exact same home region skew profile as NU? </p>
<p>I guess I’m just trying to figure out the rules of when being closer to national rep is a sign of greater prestige versus just an accident of geographical location, and when being regionally skewed is a sign of “oh, you’re just a place for the locals” versus “too busy and important doing other things to bother with the people who haven’t already heard of you.” </p>
<p>It’s fascinating and very revealing how the interpretations change when different colleges are named and paired, since all the schools here are excellent schools with bright students. </p>
<p>Completely agree, GFG. </p>
<p>I was wondering if instead of just population related %, may be , a barometer of academic measure (say NMSF cutoff) is what drives these decisions? I understand not everyone takes PSAT but may be something similar. From what I have seen numbers wise, CA, MA, CT, NY , TX generally have higher NMSF cutoffs in these measures (again, understand that it is skewed measure - but you gotta have something )… so, may be that’s what colleges take into consideration? So, may be a college says, I want to make up my freshman class with 70% from high scorers/ achievers and use the rest for other. If those high scorers happen to be from above concentrated areas, then, that’s what we see. There are many fallacies to this approach too. </p>
<p>Another point also is how far folks would travel - especially considering OOS costs? Admission to selective colleges and enrollment in it may be skewed because many who get admitted cannot enroll. So, may be compare “admitted” not “enrolled” to population % to get better perspective. Just a thought!</p>
<p>"As for the NU question, I have often wondered if part of the name recognition of schools is significantly enhanced by a school name that contains a specific state or city. Northwestern sounds like it could be in Washington State by the name, if you didn’t know it wasn’t. There would be no doubt where the Univ. of Chicago is, and there shouldn’t be any doubt where WUSTL is either. "</p>
<p>Agreed. Likewise, I imagine most people couldn’t tell you where Brown or Dartmouth are. </p>
<p>“It’s been said here that schools like Princeton aren’t doing a good enough job attracting these students in underrepresented regions. But there are quite a few of students from the midwest that don’t care for Princeton. They want to attend U of Chicago or WashU or some other great school closer to them. Should Princeton try harder to convince these students to not be so “regional”? Is it worth that effort?”</p>
<p>Try to leave politics and the specific individual I’m citing out of a response and just focus on this conceptually: Michelle Robinson was a bright girl of promise who lived within spitting distance of the U of Chicago. Yet 30 years ago, Princeton engaged in efforts to “find her and lift her out.” Presumably they thought it was worth it to find and extract diamonds in the rough. So why wouldn’t we think that that’s a similar institutional priority today? There was presumably no shortage of diamonds in the rough between NYC and Phila, yet they did outreach elsewhere. Why do you suppose that was? </p>
<p>Please do NOT derail this with a discussion of Michelle per se; just think about the concept behind what Princeton did. </p>
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Many local kids apply ED because that is where they want to go and they can’t change their mind later?[/qutoe]</p>
<p>Or viewed another way: its much easier – and cheaper – to apply EA and then go visit IFF accepted.</p>
<p>Wouldn’t it be understandable that schools with an historically longer national reputation may not work as hard to attract students, and may assume that their school is so very well-known, that everyone in the typical elite school demographic who wants to attend will apply? If you read some of the college tour thread, there are some schools that came off as not caring one whit about attracting students; it was clearly all about their choice in accepting the student. Certainly we felt that way at Princeton and Harvard.</p>
<p>PG I think you misunderstood me. I didn’t mean schools like Princeton shouldn’t spend any effort to get students from all over the place. Instead I meant to point out that many students will prefer to go to schools close by no matter what. If Princeton can find the oboe player they want in Chicago and that high school student wants Northwestern, then Princeton may have to settle for another living close by in New Jersey. I just mean to emphasize that there are characteristics that schools like Princeton are looking for, but it may end up being easier finding students with those characteristics nearby. In order to get the students they love, they may have to “settle” on those in their region since more from that region seem to want to go there. With everything being equal a school like Princeton may have chosen that great oboe applicant from Chicago over one close by, but the one in Chicago was never going to be interested.</p>
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<p>I would have expected WUSTL to have the same impact from ED but I don’t track how many people are admitting early at these schools (I did hear NU ED admissions went up this year but they turned down someone in Texas whom I think they should have admitted ED). Duke also admitted a 100 more ED students this year.</p>
<p>Personally I don’t believe the schools need to mirror populations in regions in order to be considered national. They should admit the best students while ensuring a diverse student population. If that means they take only one student from Rhode Island and he/she doesn’t show up, so be it.</p>
<p>"Instead I meant to point out that many students will prefer to go to schools close by no matter what. If Princeton can find the oboe player they want in Chicago and that high school student wants Northwestern, then Princeton may have to settle for another living close by in New Jersey. "</p>
<p>Thank you for clarifying, GrudeMonk. </p>
<p>I don’t disagree that all else bring equal, many students prefer to stay closer to home. </p>
<p>Nonetheless, some colleges exhibit different regional patterns. </p>
<p>Cornell and Penn and USC exhibit one set of patterns - very high home region, low everywhere else. </p>
<p>Harvard, Yale, Brown, Dartmouth, Princeton, Columbia, Northwestern, Stanford have another set - high home region, average one other region, low remaining regions. </p>
<p>Yet another set of patterns with MIT (still high home region but well represented everywhere else), and U of Chicago, Vanderbilt, WashU and Emory. </p>
<p>So this isn’t just mere “everyone likes to stay at home.”</p>