The average gpa for Union is only 3.4, yet has a 38% acceptance rate? Can anyone provide some insight into admissions difficulty
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Well the average SAT among admits this year was 1960 and average ACT was 30.
They let in about 40% of their class through the ED round – a lot. And the ED acceptance rate is well north of 50%. That isn’t too surprising given their overall yield was only around 25% – they want to let in a bunch through ED to try to protect/improve that yield.
So the kids who apply and are accepted are probably mostly smart kids from pretty competitive high schools/boarding schools, who are also accepted to plenty of other schools. That explains the test scores, relatively low GPA, and low yield.
They show lots of love to their ED applicants.
Union is the #38 LAC according to USNews. I realize that’s just one ranking, but to me that means that Union is at least a pretty decent school and well worth the app if you like it and can afford it.
@prezbucky how do you explain the very competitive acceptance rate, yet low average gpa
Not top-of-the-class high school students from competitive schools. Average ACT is 30. At my high school, if you had a 3.4, you scored around 25…
Athletes will drag down the GPA too.
44% had above a 3.5
My guess is, a lot of the high-GPA admits choose other schools. That certainly jives with their low yield.
Any reason why it’s such a highly ranked school?
The stats are kids who enrolled. It’s a very good school with a long history. Look into the specifics. But many, many kids who apply are using a lot of the NE LACs as back-ups.
They show:
SAT middle 50%: 610-680 critical reading, 630-720 math (old SAT scores, tests administered before March 2016)
ACT middle 50%: 29-32
@NJperson3675309, Union is probably highly ranked because it has excellent academics. GPA can be deceiving because it depends on the school that gave it. At many prep schools where they don’t weight, that wouldn’t be bad at all.
The kids from our school who got in there (and attended) were all very smart. It’s dangerous to make a generalization from a few data points, but if I were going to do it, I would say that they were more likely to be “pointy” academics, which is to say highly accomplished in one area (i.e., math) at the expense of others.
I really liked this school and thought they were doing quite a bit right. If you’re interested, you should visit and check it out.
I believe Union is test optional- so only kids with good test scores submit them. The smart kids that are bad test takers don’t submit them (like at many other LACs)… this causes high GPA but lower test scores.
USNWR assigned Union a selectivity rank of 24 (tie) within the NLAC category. By the publication’s methodology, this would suggest Union’s doors to be slightly more competitive for admission than, for comparison, Bucknell’s or Lafayette’s (both tied at 26).
This, courtesy of @gardenstategal, too.