<p>^^ Good to know it’s uncommon. I’d not have doubted this, was just pointing out that I thought it was one of the more interesting questions the OP brought up.</p>
<p>Tht siteen percent acceptance rate was from the fall of 07 admissions cycle, quite a while back.</p>
<p>Actually, that’s not quite a while back considering that there has only been one complete admissions cycle between now and then. You’re right though, newer data would be nice, so I’ll point you to our 2008 admissions stats, here: [Caltech</a> Undergraduate Admissions: Facts & Stats](<a href=“http://admissions.caltech.edu/about/stats]Caltech”>http://admissions.caltech.edu/about/stats)</p>
<p>17.3%. Interesting. Higher than 2007. (by the way, Harvard’s dropped to 7.1%… we’re over double their rate)</p>
<p>mathboy98- “I have seen some Caltech admits that aren’t even close to the Caltech type at all in spirit (i.e. I could say I’ve seen more math/science passion elsewhere), but had very good grades and scores, including in math and science, but nothing particularly special in math and science.”</p>
<p>Where have you seen these admits? I understand what you are saying, but I also contend that what is shown in a college application isn’t necessarily what’s apparent elsewhere. My comment was only regarding how Caltech makes decisions from a student’s application, and with that in mind, it IS blatantly false that math/science ECs are secondary in the decision process to grades/SAT. A 4.0 and 2400 won’t* get you into Caltech if you don’t show passion for math and science in some way, and one of these ways is through math/science ECs. *I won’t deny that mistakes are made, but I am only speaking to how Caltech makes its decisions since this is what the OP was commenting on. The fact that mistakes can be made in the decision process doesn’t change the fact that math/science ECs are not secondary.</p>
<p>Upon further thought, I retract my use of the word “blatantly,” and amend it to “completely.” The OP’s statement may not be “blatantly” false to people who are not familiar with Caltech admissions, which the OP clearly is not.</p>
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<p>Well, OK I’m far from wanting to argue about this too much, but would you say that getting close to an 800 on 2 science SAT II’s, and an 800 on the Math IIC is enough to show math/science passion? I know a few applicants with very high SAT’s, very high GPA’s, and roughly 800’s on the SAT II’s who made it to Caltech, without very much else – maybe a math competition here or there (note – I don’t really like math competitions myself, so perhaps I’m totally disregarding this). Now webhappy was correct in guessing these guys didn’t choose to attend Caltech. </p>
<p>I guess to answer my own question, I know too many such 800’s in math/science SAT II’s across the board type applicants who’re not that passionate about math/science in real life. How many of these make it into Caltech is another story, but I was surprised to see some of those who did. Intelligent people, but definitely not the Caltech type (again sort of clear in that they didn’t attend). </p>
<p>My roommate in college is an EE major, and the fact that he wasn’t accepted seems a huge mistake to me; he’s very smart, had excellent grades (but less than a 4.0), high SAT, high SAT II’s, took the AP Chemistry test as a freshman and stuff, and <em>most importantly</em> has been doing EE and CS stuff since he was 10, and knows a ridiculously vast amount of stuff. This guy was rejected from Caltech. And those who were accepted from his school…well I’ll leave it at that – they had more hyper-inflated grades and such, and nothing close to the passion in a specific technical subject. I’m not going to make conjectures, just stating something I’ve seen. I understand this is probably out of the ordinary as an occurrence. </p>
<p>Sorry, I hope you don’t mistake me, I hate on all schools’ admissions with no exceptions, possibly most on my own (and possibly least, in fact, on Caltech – haven’t found a better admissions model myself). Yes, that’s right – I’m prepared to say it loudly and clearly that I haven’t found a better model than Caltech’s so far.</p>
<p>I think a lot of it is how they market themselves on an application. Someone who really has no passion could make it seem like it on their application and someone who has a lot of passion could do a poor job showing it. I was the latter for my EA application to MIT and did a horrible job and was rejected but two months later, when I knew what I was doing I did a much better job communicating my passions on my RD Caltech application and got in. I can’t know for sure but I feel like that made the difference.</p>
<p>MIT cares increasingly less about passion for math and science.</p>
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I would say that in my experience that high SAT IIs in the sciences would not be enough. I also agree with Balaylay that it really is how a student markets themselves in the application. If they only did math competitions, but then write they write an essay about their love for math and what makes math competitions great, that’s a lot more helpful than just a list of ECs.</p>
<p>Right, exactly – I agree with you both greatly. That is the one problem and major flaw I see. Caltech’s process, else, is virtually flawless. The problem really is that people who have less of a passion can make it seem like they have a great one in their essays (of course, it isn’t quite <em>faking</em> but it’s called presenting the right aspects of yourself), and people who breathe and do math/science in their spare time may not show it in their applications very well; for one thing, I don’t think the EE-obsessed guy I told you of was the type to give a damn enough to do anything much that was specifically “application-presentable” – you wouldn’t know he’s so good at what he does unless you tried to dig deep into his knowledge by asking him.</p>
<p>Further, I know that while both the two guys I spoke of in example are fairly well-spoken, the one who was accepted to Caltech is probably better by a long shot at marketing himself. I think my roommate may have chosen to attend Caltech (not sure, though, since the EE program at my school is fantastic too), but the other guy who was accepted seems very unlikely to have accepted the offer.</p>
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<p>Right, high SAT II’s in my humble opinion mean very, very, <em>very</em> little indeed, in the face of what Caltech is about. I’ve looked in depth at the Caltech curricula, and I think decently high SAT II’s are all one need ask for, and it’s a different kind of intelligence and passion one needs to succeed through Caltech’s rigor.</p>
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<p>I love MIT to death as a school, but I frankly favor the way Caltech admits its students to how MIT does. And I don’t buy that the schools are so different that MIT needs to do admissions so differently – both are hotspots for technical excellence in some sense or the other, after all.</p>
<p>Actually, one of the few things I think Caltech could ask of its students to really perfect its process is an interview, in which the student actively discusses his/her math/science interest. And I mean, not purely in an abstract, philosophical way, but really actually throwing around math/science terminology.</p>
<p>theend, acceptance rate is the number of seats available divided by the yield divided by the number of applicants. How does a school manipulate these parameters?</p>
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Right, exactly – I agree with you both greatly. That is the one problem and major flaw I see. Caltech’s process, else, is virtually flawless. The problem really is that people who have less of a passion can make it seem like they have a great one in their essays (of course, it isn’t quite <em>faking</em> but it’s called presenting the right aspects of yourself), and people who breathe and do math/science in their spare time may not show it in their applications very well.
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I agree with you, but I don’t see this as a problem with Caltech’s system so much as a problem with college admissions as a whole. There is simply no way to get the full picture of a person from a college application. Admissions readers do the best they can with limited information, and I don’t think you can really blame them if a student fails to present themselves adequately/ presents themselves “too” adequately. This is why I try to tell people applying to Caltech that they should make sure to get their passion for math/science across, but only if its genuine. It’s really the student that gets hurt in the end if they end up coming to Caltech without passion.</p>
<p>^^ I totally agree it’s a general problem, and I guess the one thing (whether unrealistic or not is another story) I favor is for there to be face-to-face encounters with students, or at least phone-to-phone encounters, in which what they are like is confirmed. And I mean, for instance, actually asking them – what kinds of math have you studied? What ideas were interesting to you? </p>
<p>Nobody can fake being passionate about math or physics to me if I get to actually talk to him/her, even if over the phone. And I’m no expert admissions officer. It’s pretty clear when someone is vastly into the subjects he/she studies, and has interest in going deep.</p>
<p>I don’t know why Caltech admissions no longer does interviews. I believe they did once, but I could be wrong. One guess would be that with Caltech’s relatively small size, it simply isn’t feasible to get enough Alumni/admissions officers to conduct interviews for all the applicants. I wouldn’t be opposed to seeing Caltech do interviews, but I do think they have their own problems; you probably can’t fake math/science passion in an interview, but if you don’t interview well you could possibly wreck an otherwise good application.</p>
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<p>I can’t agree more with this. Short of making sure that your interviewer is versed in your intended field of study, it can give them the wrong impression. I’m pretty sure that that was what killed my MIT application, since the interviewer know nothing about Bio, and spent half the time trying asking me questions that were already on the application, and the other half trying to convince me to be a civil engineer.</p>
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<p>Well, think of it this way – someone who’s otherwise a great math/science enthusiast could wreck his/her chances by not presenting him/herself well in an application. I’m pretty sure this happens to many, actually. </p>
<p>I honestly think the ideal way the interview should go, though, is to have it be somewhat open-ended, so you can really give an idea of your passion. I’d also prefer that the interviewer be somewhat versed in what you like. I.e., at least a biologist or chemist if you indicate you’re interested in biology. If you indicate you like math, not a biologist, maybe a computer scientist, physicist, or at best, a mathematician. </p>
<p>The student should ideally have a slight say on who should talk to him/her. This can’t be impossible to arrange, I imagine. </p>
<p>The thing is, if an interview is somewhat technically involved, then the student need not be a natural at answering interview questions or anything – the student should just be able to talk about stuff he/she is already interested in. I think this is probably not too much to ask. MIT’s interviews, from what I heard, could get pretty out there. They weren’t very straightforward at all.</p>
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<p>There is no school in the U.S. which conducts this sort of interview. Oxford has an oral exam of sorts in the spirit of what you are saying.</p>
<p>It’s not a bad idea. However, I don’t think the number of Caltech alumni is sufficient to do interviews. They didn’t do interviews when I applied. I don’t think they ever did interviews.</p>
<p>I think Rick Bischoff said that admissions would like to conduct interviews but “doesn’t have enough people to interview everyone just in our own office”</p>
<p>is this a joke? How did the discussion of sports teams at Caltech even come up? And, if it doesn’t appeal to you, then why do you care so much? It looks like you want to go there so much, but think you don’t have a chance, so you’re just *****ing to us about your problems. I personally think there are many ways Caltech can improve, but why do you care so much…there are so many other colleges…</p>