<p>When you apply to a certain college, are you competing with other kids in the same state as you, same school, or same major as you? I thought it would be major but i'm not sure. </p>
<p>Depends on the college. Some colleges have “affected” majors, meaning they are very popular and can only admit a certain number of students into the program. An example is Carnegie Mellon’s computer science major. Most selective colleges claim to not set limits for the # of students from a particular high school.</p>
<p>At certain colleges you apply to the university as a whole and can select whatever major you want. At others you may apply directly to a certain school, and each school under the university can have varying acceptance rates.</p>
<p>Probably. For example, Carnegie Mellon is known for their Computer Science. A lot of people apparently want to go there for CS. I’ve calculated that the acceptance rate for CS is about 4%, even if their overall rate is 18%. </p>
<p>I’ve made it a habit to mathematically calculate my chances. Instead of arbituarily coming on CC and asking “What are my chances?” if you have the right statistics you can get a rough, numerical estimate. I compare myself to others considering my gender, intended major, race, and income bracket. etc. </p>
<p>It would make sense that you are being compared to others in your major at some point. Aren’t they trying to build a mathematically proportional, diverse class? </p>
<p>Yeah thanks for the advice. I’m trying to go to Duke Computer Science which isn’t a very popular program considering most Duke ppl are applying for Bio or Econ. Would this help me out with my chances since I have a little bit lower stats than what Duke wants? I have some unique extracirrics so I’m hopin those help me out. </p>
<p>Most people in my school are applying to Duke for Math or Bio so would I be in competition with them?</p>
<p>How is JHU for Bio-Engr? I could not get ED for BME. </p>
<p>JHU is number one in the world for BME and, like CMU’s CS department, acceptance into the BME program is extremely impacted. The regular acceptance rate at Hopkins is ~15% whereas the acceptance rate into BME is less than 10% (they don’t actually publish the numbers, but there are only about 120 BMEs per class at Hopkins). </p>