Michigan wouldn’t mind providing applicants with an ED option. The main obstacle to that happening is the lack of public peers that offer ED. The Cal, Texas-Austin, UCLA, UDub, UIUC, UVa and Wisconsin-Madison do not offer ED.
Not until UMich can meet the needs of OOS students also, ED means nothing. Admitted students would just back out with insufficient financial aids. It would not serve the purpose of ED like those need met privates.
^^^Excellent point. Maybe the current capital campaign—which is raising funds to enable better FA for OOS—is the first step toward an eventual ED option.
Excellent point indeed billcsho and brantly. Michigan is definitely making strides in the FA department, but it still has ways to go. Perhaps in 2020 or so. Furthermore, I do not think many qualified students outside of Michigan would consider Michigan their first choice at this time. While Michigan’s appeal and reputation in academe and corporate America is on par with its private peers, among high school students, it is still lagging. This is rapidly changing as Michigan’s admissions statistics synchs up with those are other top universities, and the University’s reputation amongst applicants should be all but even by 2020. It will be interesting to see what happens then.
Got into Michigan with 35 act oos, double legacy though
@Alexandre @brantly @billcsho So in the aftermath, I got deferred like every other kid I know in the state of Georgia who applied with competitive applications. I had a 35 ACT, 3.93 UW GPA, all-state percussionist, President of two clubs, co-founded a non-profit, and even co-founded a business which has made a $70k with Coca Cola. In addition to these, I’ve driven up to Michigan twice to visit the campus in the last four years, I got my stat teacher (a Michigan alum) to write me a recommendation, and I also sent in a letter stating that I would matriculate if accepted in EA.
Despite all this, I was still deferred. Which leads me to wonder: what more did they expect a student to have in order to accept them? All of my friends in Georgia were deferred as well and they have quite impressive applications too.
However, there was a common link between all of us: none of us had legacy. So after all this, I have come to conclude that U of M simply defers all Out Of State, non-legacy kids.
This policy also makes me wonder how Ross picks their kids bc they are missing out on soooo many qualified OOS kids who totally deserve but get deferred bc of this rigged system.
@tarun5629 There are just way too many high quality applicants. From the admitted students reported so far, the average is a little bit higher than 2 years ago again. The lower admission rate from your district may be related to a lower yield rate in the past. They did not defer all OOS students. There are 80+% oos applicants and ~85% EA applicants would be deferred.
@tarun5629, to which college did you apply? If it was COE, they might be wondering why you don’t attend your own very good state engineering school. You said yourself you aren’t a legacy so no ties to UofM. Send grades as asked and do a good job of explaining why UofM engineering vs. your own state uni. What will Michigan give you that your own uni won’t give you? Really if you applied to any college at Michigan you should be able to explain “Why Michigan” vs. what you have in your own state. This is true for any out of state candidates.
@tarun5629 I am a fellow out of state (Georgia) applicant. I have been accepted into LSA. Truthfully speaking, your statistics out stands mine; however, one factor to my application was the fact that my brother attends COE at University of Michigan. Do not fret over the decision because your stats and extracurricular show a great potential!
This is precisely what happened last year at my child’s high school in the NY suburbs and confirms my theory: Applicants with no connection to Michigan do not get in EA. That said, I’m sure now someone will come up with an example of an unconnected applicant who did—but, I think it is rare and would be related to some other trait that the school has determined is related to matriculation. EA at Michigan has become very data-driven to get a handle on yield.
tarun5629 Do not lose hope. Have your guidance counselor call (after the new year) and tell them that you will attend if admitted (assuming that’s true).
tarun, you are obviously a very worthy candidate, and since Michigan is your first choice, I would have hoped that you would have been admitted at this point. That being said, I have known many students with similar credentials who were deferred at this stage, but then admitted in the RD phase and eventually made it to Ross, either as PA, or once on campus. Let me put it another way, had you applied to Cornell or Northwestern ED, would you have been surprised or angry had they deferred you or even rejected you? Michigan is just as selective for OOS applicants.
Did you apply ED anywhere, or was Michigan your only EA school? At this point, I recommend you send in a letter reiterating your interest sometime in late January/early February. As I said earlier, a letter from you guaranteeing that you will matriculate if admitted is fine, but not as effective as one coming from your counselor. Students often promise to attend only to go back on their word. If a school guarantees your enrollment, you will have no choice but to go. But please, be sure you are 100% sure that you will enroll if you ask your counselor to write such an undertaking on your behalf.
From Michigan’s admissions office’s point of view, they are understandably suspicious of high stat OOS student. While Michigan’s reputation, prestige and appeal in academe, corporate America and among the educated elite places it among the elite, among high school students, it usually falls short of such lofty heights. Most high school students, especially from OOS, would choose elite private universities over Michigan. As long as that is the case, Michigan is going to continue approaching high stat OOS applicants with caution, and rightly so.
My experience, or rather my brother’s, is that Michigan DOES offer very good financial aid for OOS. His unmet need was just $5,400. Indeed, he received much better FA from Michigan than USC, NYU or CWRU. So don’t assume you won’t get a good package. However, also don’t assume that what you want to pay is what they will expect you to pay!
As someone accepted with less than stellar “stats”, I would encourage you to review you gets accepted and who gets deferred/rejected. Great “stats” will NOT guarantee you admission now or under RD. Michigan practices holistic admissions. They say this every year and every year there are hundreds of posts from students who claim they are “overqualified”. Sorry, but you cannot be over qualified and rejected. If you are rejected, you did not meet their requirements.
“Michigan wouldn’t mind providing applicants with an ED option. The main obstacle to that happening is the lack of public peers that offer ED. The Cal, Texas-Austin, UCLA, UDub, UIUC, UVa and Wisconsin-Madison do not offer ED.”
That’s what I don’t understand. For that obstacle to disappear one of those schools has to start, right? How would that school eventually make that decision?
My daughter got into Stamps College of Art. We are out of state (TX) with no legacy. However, her employer (she nannied for 3 summers full time for them) is an alum and wrote a letter. Maybe it helped! I do know they value their network and legacy, which honestly is one thing that draws her to them.
That said, Stamps is different, since your portfolio bears considerable weight. They told us at National Portfolio Day that they accept half of their class of 170 from EA.
Her stats are almost exactly what they said their averages are - 2000 SAT, 3.7 GPA (UW). She also demonstrated interest by meeting with them at NPD her junior and senior years, and sent her SAT score the first time she took it, her junior year.
My S is OOS, 4.0/34. 4 years of strong athletic ec’s and service. He was expecting to be deferred, but was accepted EA. His essays were very good. And he did the Why Michigan specific to LSA and Ross. They don’t defer all OOS. The whole first round of acceptaces posted here were OOS with very high stats. Why they got in and you were deferred is a question, but they don’t just defer.
To answer the Q, no legacy, no URM, not a hook. Just a high stat NY suburban kid.
The pure speculation based on anecdotal evidence on this site always amazes me. You have a handful of students at a high school or in an area who are accepted/rejected/deferred, and all of a sudden a conclusion is drawn about Michigan’s admission practices. And if you are going on reported decisions on this site, that is ludicrous since this site probably attracts a tiny, tiny fraction of all applicants to Michigan.
Remember you are talking about 50,000+ applications. Out of those, Michigan has to manage its enrollment to produce a freshman class of about 6,000. Imagine that task. It has had issues with overenrollement in past years, which it is trying to avoid. When it offers every single acceptance, of course it has to consider the likelihood of that student accepting. I would guess one of the top factors that go into that determination is affordability, since many OOS are simply not going to be able to afford it, no matter how badly they want to go there. (Every year there is someone posting on here, "tell me how I can afford Michigan!). For OOS who have a connection to Michigan, there is a greater likelihood they would be willing to cough up the money or take on the debt to pay for it. Secondly would be the options that that student would have at other (and possibly more affordable) schools. A high-achieving student is in fact going to have lots of options, decreasing the chances that the student would definitively pick Michigan. Please note that I am not saying Michigan is selecting “sub-par” students; obviously that is not the case at all. But there are way too many qualified students for the number of openings at this or any other top university. Therefore, Michigan can use whatever calculus they want to achieve their desired outcome.
I also have a hard time believing legacy really matters that much. Michigan has more living alumni than any other school. They could probably fill their freshman class several times over with legacies,and obviously they don’t. Again, the anecdotal “evidence” is at work here in the perception that there is some significant boost.
My daughter was accepted and is THRILLED! Michigan was one of her reach schools and a good match for her. She loves Ross and really put a lot into her Why Michigan essay. She also visited campus last summer. She has an unweighted 4.0, ranked 1/207, NMSF, AP Scholar w distinction, weighted gpa 4.76. She will graduate with 13 ap classes and has passed all of her exams so far (8) with all but 1 being a 4 or 5 score. She is very involved at school with SGA, president/founder of a club, vp of another club and in several others, on academic quiz team, cheerleader and involved in community service groups. SAT 2190 only took it once so no superscore. We are OOS in FL with no legacy. As far as I know, nobody before her has ever been admitted from our high school. She was admitted to arts and sciences and is now waiting to hear from Ross. We know it’s a long shot, but we have our fingers crossed! Just getting into Michigan is amazing and she is thrilled!
What I find amazing is the number of parents posting on a website intended for students. What’s more, they broadcast their kids “stats”. I recently saw a parent at a college night passing out their senior’s RESUME! The admissions reps were chuckling. Lighten up and let your children have this experience!