College Admissions Statistics Class of 2021: Early and Regular Decision Acceptance Rates

[spayurpets]

Now that the first decisions are out for the Class of 2021, I’m restarting this popular discussion topic for another year. I hope one of the moderators will pin this to the top of the thread so people can share the admissions rates and statistics as they are released.

[spayurpets]

Starting off with Penn:

Penn ED 1354 out of 6147 (22.0%)

http://www.thedp.com/article/2016/12/early-decision-release

BREAKING: Early decision acceptance rate drops to 22 percent

By Julia Bell

Dean of Admissions Eric Furda said the University of Pennsylvania’s Early Decision applicant pool expanded geographically and socioeconomically.

Penn admitted 22 percent of its Early Decision applicants to the Class of 2021 this year, slightly lower than last year’s rate of 23.2 percent.

For the first time in Penn’s history, half of students admitted to the School for Engineering and Applied Sciences in the Early Decision round are female, according to a press release from the Office of Admissions.

The application pool was also record-breaking. A total 6,147 applications were submitted to Penn in the Early Decision round, more than Penn has ever received. Of that number 1,354 were accepted.

The number of Early Decision applications increased by seven percent from last year, and has grown by 28 percent in the last four years since the Class of 2017 applied.

“The continued growth in Penn’s Early Decision applicant pool is a reflection of a greater breadth of interest in Penn,” Dean of Admissions Eric Furda said in a statement.

So far, Penn’s incoming class includes students from 46 states and 44 foreign countries. Penn also partnered with over 40 community-based organizations that represent underserved students, like the national non-profit program QuestBridge and Philadelphia’s Steppingstone Scholars program.

Penn typically admits around half of its total class in the Early Decision round. Last year, 55 percent of the total 2,445 spots available were filled by Early Decision applicants.

[spayurpets]

I’ve heard that Stanford and University of Georgia have already announced.

Here’s a UGA blog post:

While official statistics will come out early next week about the admitted freshman, here are some limited statistics on this group:

Quick Early Action Numbers*

Applications Received: 15,614
Offers of Admission: 8,059
Mid 50% Admitted Average GPA: 4.00-4.26
Mid 50% Admitted Average SAT (old, CR+M): 1300-1480

Mid 50% Admitted Average SAT (new, EBRW+M): 1300-1430
Mid 50% Admitted Average ACT: 30-33
Mid 50% Admitted AP/IB/MOWR courses (over 4 years: 6-11)
-Academic Rigor is based on an overall core course review, but this gives a good glance at the challenge of our admitted student’s curriculum.

• Please Remember that these numbers are mid-ranges, not minimums.

http://ugaadmissions.blogspot.com/2016/11/early-action-decisions-are-available.html

[spayurpets]

Penn ED 1354 out of 6147 (22.0%)
University of Georgia EA 8059 out of 15,614 (51.6%)

[spayurpets]

@“Erin’s Dad” Any chance of getting this discussion pinned to the top of the thread so people can find it? Lots of interest in last year’s discussion.

[citymama9]

How did UGA all of a sudden get so hard to get into? Those stats are very, very high

[spayurpets]

Hmm, Stanford has decided not to provide admissions data for REA this year.

http://www.stanforddaily.com/2016/12/10/in-break-from-past-stanford-declines-to-release-early-admissions-data/

[spayurpets]

Here’s Williams:
http://communications.williams.edu/news-releases/12_12_2016_earlydecision/

Williams College Admits 257 to Class of 2021 in Early Decision Plan

WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass., December 12, 2016—Williams College has offered admission to 257 students under its Early Decision plan. These students make up nearly 47 percent of the incoming Class of 2021, whose ultimate target size is 550.

Richard Nesbitt, director of admission, said 728 students applied, a 25 percent increase over last year and a record number for Early Decision. “We were particularly pleased with the increase in applications from high-achieving, low-income students, which I attribute to our intensive efforts to extend our message of access and affordability to students of all socioeconomic backgrounds,” he says.

---

Of the 257 admitted students, 140 identify as men, 94 as women. One identifies as agender and 22 students did not respond to an optional question about gender identity (but did answer a required binary question that appears on the application).

American students of color are 30 percent of the Early Decision admits, including 27 who identified as African American, 30 as Asian American, 18 as Latino, and one as Native American. Twelve students opted not to share information about their race or ethnicity. Twenty-five are first-generation college students (that is, neither parent has a four-year college degree), and nearly 20 percent of Early Decision admits come from low-income families. Eighteen students admitted through Early Decision participated in Windows on Williams, an all-expenses-paid program that provides talented, high-achieving high school seniors from low-income backgrounds the opportunity to visit campus during the fall of their senior year.

Applicants to the Class of 2021 had the opportunity to submit standardized test scores for the ACT, the redesigned SAT, or the old SAT, and their test score averages are in line with previous Early Decision cohorts: ACT average of 33, old SAT averages of 731 in critical reading, 727 in math, and 725 in writing, and redesigned SAT averages of 724 in evidence based reading and writing and 720 in math. Of those admitted who reported class rank, 83 percent were among the top 10 percent of their high school classes.

[yankeeinGA]

@citymama9 said: “How did UGA all of a sudden get so hard to get into? Those stats are very, very high”

I think more and more, kids in-state who qualify for HOPE or Zell are finding that there is no better deal than staying in-state with the state tuition money, and if you’re not a Tech kid, UGA is your the next “best” school. We hear stories of kids who weren’t even all that keen on UGA being offered all sorts of perks by their parents to stay in-state (“Go to UGA and we’ll buy you a new car!”) because of the savings there. So for the last 5-10 years the admission stats have been crawling up-up-up.

Friends my age who went to UGA “back in the day” say they’d never be able to get in given the admission standards, now. As application numbers go up, they can afford to be more and more selective.

[spayurpets]

Adding Williams:

Penn ED 1354 out of 6147 (22.0%)
Williams ED 257 out of 728 (35.3%)
University of Georgia EA 8059 out of 15,614 (51.6%)

[IN4655]

I’ve always thought that early decision acceptance rates includes students who were originally accepted in Early Decision, as well as students who were deferred and then later accepted. I’m assuming now this is not the case?

[spayurpets]

@IN4655 ED/EA acceptance rates do not include the deferred and later accepted students. A handful of schools do report this figure, but, for obvious reasons, it is not until the spring when the final RD acceptances are sent.

[IN4655]

I’m curious then, considering that more of these applicants are accepted than I originally thought how much easier is it really for an Early Decision applicant to be accepted? Say for instance Northwestern whose Regular Decision Acceptance Rate hovers around 8-11% but ED acceptance rate hovers more around 30-37%. Adjusted this could mean that 8-10% of people who apply RD first are accepted while over 40% of people who applied ED could be sooner or later accepted. Is this mostly due to a more competitive class or are students getting in that much easier? It would be interesting to see an average SAT for ED to RD admittance to compare the two in a case like this where there is such a gap between the two.

[spayurpets]

It’s a perennial question, whether there is an advantage to apply ED or not. I think the school admissions officers say no, that there is no advantage, because once you take out the athletes and legacies, the numbers even out. At some point with the gap as wide as it is with some schools, it’s hard to disguise that advantage.

[spayurpets]

Columbia ED release, but as is their usual practice, they do not provide data on the number of students accepted.

The Office of Undergraduate Admissions received 4,086 early decision applications to Columbia College and the School of Engineering and Applied Science this year, once again setting a record for the largest number of early decision applicants in Columbia history.

The number of early decision applicants rose by 16 percent from last year, when the office received 3,520 applications. At the time, last year’s pool was just 4.4 percent larger than the 3,373 applicants in 2014.

http://columbiaspectator.com/news/2016/12/12/cc-seas-class-2021-sets-record-largest-number-early-decision-applicants

[mjrube94]

There has been a pretty large increase in the number of ED apps for Penn (up 7%), Williams (up 25%) and Columbia (up 16%). Do you think that the number of ED apps are up overall, or do you think the total number is about the same, which would mean other schools showing a decrease in ED apps?

(Can you tell I’m hoping that the school my D is EDing to shows a 25% drop in ED apps, LOL).

[098123Student]

I believe the change in FAFSA filing from Jan to Oct has greatly contributed to Early Admissions numbers.

[osuprof]

A couple of remarks:

I think ED applications are increasing because students/parents/counselors are figuring out that it is the most likely path to a top 15-20 school. Also, everyone is starting preparation for exams early, so very few of the strong applicants are not ready with scores by 1st November or even 15th October.

Schools like ED because it helps them both report a lower admission rate and higher yield. Suppose a school has 2000 seats, about 40% yield for RD, 3,000 ED applicants and 32,000 RD applicants. Now, if you accept 50% of the class in ED, you need to admit 2500 in RD. This means an acceptance rate of 10%, and yield of nearly 57%.

Now, instead if you shoot for a smaller fraction of class from ED, say, 500. This will mean admitting 3750 from RD, leading to an acceptance rate of 12%, and yield below 50%.

Which one will a university prefer?

[spayurpets]

Cornell ED data and newspaper article. It contains a chart that I could not copy, but it contains this additional information:

Accepted 25.6%
Deferred 20.9%
Rejected 53.5%
The early decision applicant pool for the Class of 2021 was the biggest in Cornell’s history.

http://cornellsun.com/2016/12/13/cornell-sees-10-percent-boom-in-early-decision-applications/

Cornell Sees 10 Percent Boom in Early Decision Applications

A record number of 5,384 students applied early decision for admission to Cornell’s Class of 2021, representing a 10.3 percent increase from last year, according to Jason Locke, associate vice provost for enrollment.

This year’s numbers broke the record, set last year by the early decision Class of 2020. Locke noted that this growing number of applicants represents the continuation of a general trend — Cornell’s early decision pool has increased by 78 percent within the past decade.

“With a smart, focused recruitment strategy in place, we have been experiencing a general upward trend in applications for many years,” he said.

Columbia University, Yale University and the University of Pennsylvania, among others, also saw their biggest influx of early applicants yet.

Of these applicants to Cornell, 25.6 percent were admitted — a smaller fraction than last year, when the University accepted 27.4 percent of applicants, and 2015, when it took 26.1 percent.

In addition to growing larger, the early decision pool has also become more diverse throughout the years, according to Locke.

“The University experienced increases in early decision applications across all racial and ethnic groups and across almost every region of the United States,” he said.

Locke said 50.1 percent of admits were women and 14.4 percent were international students. In addition, 35 percent of students admitted were students of color — a group that includes African American, Asian American, Native American, Latinx and multicultural students.

Legacy students make up 23.3 percent of early admits and athletes make up 13.4 percent, he added.

Locke also pointed out that this year’s applicants were the first to submit the new SAT, which was revised in 2014 and was first administered this spring.

Forty-four percent of applicants submitted the new exam, while 35 percent submitted the old and 53 percent chose to take the ACT, Locke said, adding that many students choose to submit more than one test.

The University plans to notify its regular decision applicants — who have just under a month to complete their applications — on March 30, according to Locke.

[spayurpets]

Wesleyan ED article, but Wesleyan continues practice of not releasing their acceptance rate.
http://newsletter.blogs.wesleyan.edu/2016/12/12/early-decision-applications-up-more-than-16/

Early Decision Applications Up More than 16%

Wesleyan received 742 applications for early decision this fall, an increase of 16.6 percent over last year. The increase of more than 100 applications provided Wesleyan with its biggest pool ever in early decision, according to Nancy Hargrave Meislahn, dean of admission and financial aid.

Additionally, Wesleyan received the most ever applications from international students, up 75 percent. Other diversity measures were also strong, with a 44 percent increase from students of color in the United States and a 56 percent increase from African American students.

“These results are most gratifying,” Meislahn said. “Potential applicants hold Wesleyan in high regard and to have so many see Wesleyan as their first and only choice should make us all proud.”

The early decision application increase follows a substantial jump last year in applications overall. For the class of 2020 entering this fall, 12,026 students had applied, marking a 22 percent increase over the previous year and a 10 percent increase over the previous all-time high three years ago for the Class of 2017.