How accurate is collegevine’s chancing engine?
Best to ignore it.
Does your HS use Naviance?
I think it depends on your ability to assess the tier of your ECs. I’ve been thinking of building a tool like this, so it’s interesting. However, the intangibles (missing parts of the tool) of your essays, supplementals, awards, recommendations and interview make the tool anecdotal at best.
Say you’re a 4.0 student with a 1520 SAT. You’ve have good ECs with a few at the state and national level tier. You had a rigorous program with 9 APs, and 10 honors classes by the end of high school.
The tool may chance you 30% at Notre Dame. I don’t know, I’m just throwing that out there. It’s 30% of the profiles accepted by ND that compared to yours entered in the tool. But is that 30% because of the data you entered or were 30% accepted with similar data that “got it”? Did the student fit with the vibe of the school? Did the essays reflect what the student listed as ECs? Did the recommendations confirm the student as inquisitive, nerdy, introverted, bubbly, enterprising, trailblazing, a problem solver, a problem maker?
The trouble with tools is that admissions is a puzzle. There are corners, middle pieces, all oddly shaped and mostly unpredictable. But, when all the pieces come together they make a picture. Now the clearer the student paints the picture, the better chance the adcom has of assessing fit for the school. It doesn’t mean you’re in, but if you fit it’s easy to argue your case.
So, use the tool for fun. Let’s say that it can at least give you an idea of how your stats stack. Clearly, a 10% chance at a school using their tool should give you pause. That’s a reach. However, you may have hooks, extenuating circumstances, hobbies that stand out. That chance may be near 35% with your intangibles.
It’s just my take. I’m still trying to figure it all out. Our daughter just got Harvard REA 2024 and she’s going to get her file next year so we can figure out what worked in her favor and what misconceptions we may have had. Her brother is just a few years away from this process.
Good luck, oh and she chanced at 33-41% to Harvard on the tool. At the end of the day every school will be either a 1 or a 0.
For my first choice (Cornell University) it is currently changing me at 74-76% and it apparently accounts for your common app essay through peer reviews ratings into that
Very few applicants have chances that high and most are recruited athletes.
Cornell is a reach for everyone. Spend your time figuring out what schools look for from successful applicants, rather than using a dubious internet site with inaccurate and incomplete data powering its algorithm which spews out nonsense like it did for you.
Edited to add: You can tell how I really feel about sites that ‘chance’ like collegevine, parchment, et al.
Good luck to you!
It is heavily based on race because “You are primarily compared with other students who have a similar demographic background.” I am a black male with a 1470 SAT and 3.8 unweighted GPA. At Georgetown, they give me a 59-65% chance. But when I say I’m Asian, I have a 1-7% chance. The model acts as though I will only compete with other blacks. When I enter my race as “Prefer not to say,” my chances are 38-44%.
TLDR: Race heavily impacts results. Choose “Prefer not to say” for more reasonable results.
Virginia Tech stayed at 93-95% despite race.
The reality is that the more selective the school the more demographics matters. Typically, outside of T-30 schools demographics doesn’t matter much.