<p>College has a 4.7% increase, SEAS had a 20.3% increase</p>
<p>the rate of increase for SEAS really has been amazing the last few years. When I applied ED to enter in fall 2002, class of '06, the ED admit rate was ~60% and overall admit rate was something like 27%. I think applications have practically doubled since then, and SEAS has become less of a "loophole" with regard to getting into a top school.</p>
<p>Nobody really knows why, either. It could be some sort of "osmosis" where there's a perceived "loophole" that isn't well-recognized and is eventually closed through efficient behavior.</p>
<p>i'd assume that that's a contributing factor - increased informational awareness by the applicant pools means they recognize this as an "edge" and exploit it until too many people are doing so at which point the edge goes away.</p>
<p>but i think another contributing factor is that Columbia in general and SEAS in no small part have been making names for themselves lately, starting with Jeff Sachs back in 2002. There are stats out there counting the number of mentions of a university in the public press - references in major newspapers, TV appearances by professors/administrators, major scientific discoveries that make the news, etc... and I think Columbia has steadily been among the leaders in that category.</p>
<p>Whatever the reason, I think Columbia's been doing a good job of marketing itself lately.</p>
<p>okay</p>
<p>duke has had an increase in applications, williams has had an increase in applications, williams amherst and columbia have all had increases in applications. Is it just me, or does it seem that college admissions just got a lot harder for everyone this year?</p>
<p>i dont think we can discount the role that the new financial engineering major is having on the increase in SEAS applications...if you look at the graph in today's spec (which just so happens to have a messed up scale, but thats besides the point), there was a 400 applicant DROP from class of 2005 to class of 2006 and the numbers didnt recovber until last year. So it is actually just two pretty big jumps since they instituted this new major. (i'm assuming the numbers on the specs graph are correct though it does look very suspect).</p>
<p>
[quote]
duke has had an increase in applications, williams has had an increase in applications, williams amherst and columbia have all had increases in applications. Is it just me, or does it seem that college admissions just got a lot harder for everyone this year?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Not necessarily harder. The increase in applicants says nothing about people applying to more schools than they did before or unqualified applicants applying to reaches.</p>