MODERATOR’S NOTE:
Yeah, let’s move on please. The discussion is just turning into UChicago debate (and not even a new one).
Bowdoin’s # of offers is interesting. It’s a significantly lower absolute # than most of it’s elite LAC peers despite in most cases a similar total class size. It’s a similar # to Haverford despite Haverford having a class size of less than 300 while Bowdoin has a class size around 500. Is Bowdoin’s yield really dramatically better than Williams, Amherst, Swarthmore, Haverford, Barnard, etc.? Or will they be dipping heavily into a waitlist? Or something else?
Bowdoin said they had 1,000 applicants for ED1/2 but no mention of offers… if similar offer rate as Amherst potentially Bowdoin filled two thirds of class with ED1/2. Again, my beef is lack of transparency from colleges for numbers they have in hand.
Bowdoin in a recent year accepted 1015 total applicants, @citivas. As with other well-managed colleges, I’d think its early figure for this year (~831) reflects a conservative approach designed to avoid over-enrollment. This may result in an ~11% acceptance rate after offers are made from its waiting list.
For the people who argue test-optional is positive, Why consider testing at all if it’s " not a good measure of college readiness"?
Also any info on Notre Dame I feel like they released decisions first among the elite schools yet I haven’t seen their announcement?
UCLA?
UCB?
Tufts?
Umich?
UNC?
Gtown?
@emorynavy I think testing is useless because how can it really measure anything objectively if people can study/prep to learn how to take the test and take it multiple times.
@vpa2019
Someone can study for every test known to man even an IQ test and raise their score. So drivers test are useless too? And I really beg to differ on its usefulness. Only 1.5 percent of the population gets a 33 on the ACT and that’s with study prep and multiple re-takes. At the end of the day, these tests are difficult
Anyone else amazed/appalled that there are now at least 15 colleges with sub 10% admit rates and another 5-10 that could get there in the next couple years!? It’s clear there’s been a tectonic shift in the college admissions landscape for the top 50 or so schools that has only accelerated in the last few years…where does this end? I’m not convinced even the predicted coming bust in HS age kids in the mid 2020s will affect things much.
No data that I can find on the schools listed above - ED but not final numbers.
And my kids study for every HS and college test they take - I don’t believe that invalidates their entire education.
Every student studies for good grades in college too. But you still have to take mcats gmats lsats and gre’s to get into professional and grad schools. It’s the only way to evenly look at a large group with varied grading curves, professors and preparation. There is just too much variation to judge on grades alone. That’s why they look at both. Undergrad and grad.
I have absolutely zero problem with single digit admit rates. That is life. Other things have zero digit acceptance rates: Becoming a NASA astronaut, winning a job a Google or Apple, getting a prestigious scholarship, being drafted by the NFL, etc. The other thing that is interesting is that none of these things you get by just having the best numbers.
These numbers are so low because kids are applying to so many schools. There aren’t enough incremental new students to account for the +2% drop in top ten admission rates. This inflated because people are getting fee waivers to apply and they shotgun the list. Because they shotgun the list they miss a lot, by not taking the time and effort to put together one or two very strong applications.
Is it fair that for every 100 people that apply to Harvard or Yale or Chicago or MIT, more than 90 will be denied? I have no problem with that. This is life. Fortunately in the United States there are many great schools if you don’t get into the greatest ones. You don’t have to go to an IVY+ to be successful. I know many Ivy+ graduates that are less successful than I am and I went to a directional school for undergrad.
I was at a Georgetown admissions information session TODAY and the admissions counselor running the event declared:
“Georgetown has decided to join the Common Application next year…”
After I gasped he said…
April Fools! LOL he got me.
But in the context of selectivity, gaming the system by making it easier to apply and offering more (binding) admissions options, Georgetown, to their credit, continues not to cave into peer pressure. Even BC is giving in next year (@privatebanker, has this been mentioned already on this thread?) and offering ED I and ED II. (But they are getting rid of EA, which they could keep to pad the numbers a bit…but they aren’t).
Georgetown also continues to highly recommend 3 subject tests, and from what I can tell based on this year’s results, the really want them.
They seem to really only want students to apply that want to go there. And while you can call adding ED I and ED II, going test optional, no longer requiring official scores until after acceptances everything BUT gaming the system (and there may truly be other more altruistic reasons, but I personally think there is a lot of gaming going on out there…), if Georgetown went ED and joined common app, their admissions rate would plummet. But they aren’t budging and I have to say, I am impressed.
@BrianBoiler Long distance high five!
@BrianBoiler I couldn’t agree more. There are sooo many wonderful schools and if people are choosing “top choices” based on single digit admissions rates, they are likely missing out!
And the admission rates can be deceiving…lower rates don’t always mean it’s harder to get in…gaming or not, the various admissions plans have a big impact on an applicants chances.
In fact, I think just using the overall acceptance rate for any school that uses any variety of ED can be extremely deceiving. I don’t have the data to do it, but I personally think having the breakdown by ED/EA and RD is very helpful when trying to plan an admissions strategy.
A few years ago I seem to remember Lehigh’s acceptance rates being something like this:
ED I 60+%
ED II 33%
RD 19%
If I were applying to Lehigh, I would want to know that. (And Lehigh, to their credit, is very transparent with their admissions statistics…not all schools are. I feel like it should be required, honestly.)
@collegemomjam Yes you are correct. Ed 1 and Ed 2. Say goodbye to big waitlists.
My guess. Yields will go up and acceptance rates will fall. Avg stats will flatten. School will be more in control.
Choice and options for students be da*ned.
It’s the collegiate arms race and most everyone is playing. Ivy rea. Ed 1 ed 2 and teeny rd. Test optional. Free applications. Common app , fly in days. The marketing campaigns etc.
Georgetown I think distinguished itself going the other way. I’m not sure how long they will hold out. Their only issue is a very small endowment for a school of its stature. That’s once piece they need to address. It has impacted their infrastructure spending on a comparative basis and for attracting superstar academics down the road. I think they have a formula they believe has them in track to move into the top ten. I think they are already there in terms of all around student strength.
@collegemomjam Another point I think you identified perfectly.
The Ed 1 Ed 2 and rd with free apps and common app. Secure your class in ed 1 and 2. Then get a enormous amount of rd apps and take a very very low number. The combo can bring you into the teens for a selective but not highly selective student profile. But that gets the prestige wheels turning. We know the rest of the story.
@privatebanker very interesting. When he announced his April Fool’s joke about them joining common app, it made perfect sense to me…but then he was kidding. It will be interesting to see how long Georgetown and Notre Dame hold out. Notre Dame is at least Common Ap and doesn’t require subject tests (although I bet a lot of the kids that get in have them anyway).
My son is a junior. There seems to be more and more pressure each year for students to just pick an ED school, to your point about choice and options (I don’t remember this being that big of a deal for my girls when they applied)…For this reason I am glad some schools at least still have REA so at least the kids that have found their ED school aren’t competing for those spots.
@emorynavy my comment is about SAT/ACT which you were referring to not all tests. And with regard to testing in HS and college they have the same issue to a certain extent…that’s why people are concerned with grade inflation/deflation. It doesn’t invalidate what you’re learning but it isn’t always apples to apples. Don’t kmow where driver test fits in here FWIW the one given in my state is fairly useless as well.
@CU123 a few pages ago you referenced my question about schools that have SAT optional not being able to put those numbers in their stats if they aren’t reported.
I’m pretty sure some schools still make you submit your scores (not sure which ones, but possibly most?) after you are accepted, just so they have them for their records. So they actually could put them in their stats. In fact, they probably should because without them their stats could be skewed up quite a bit.
I truly think it’s a great option to offer test optional admissions as a way to try to increase applicants and enrollment of students from lower SES’s. But it’s worth noting that this is potentially another way to skew stats and therefore “prestige” or reputation, or whatever you want to call it.
It might just be impossible, in the end, to truly compare schools because there are so many different variables and some school seems to do things a little differently.
@collegemomjam I am pretty sure that schools that are test optional do not in fact require scores after admittance. What would happen if the admitted student decided not to send them? Rescind admittance? No it’s much more logical that they are simply omitted from the calculations. BTW that would tend to push up the average score as the college is most likely eliminating low scores from its average.