<p>what a small world. I go to plano west. And even my friend who's almost top ten barely made it..got into the summer program. My other friend who IS in top ten didn't even get her choice of major..just liberal arts</p>
<p>I was CAP'd.</p>
<p>shoe, UT automatically accepts all National Merit Finalists who apply...it's an unofficial policy but one the admission rep for my school told me is the case.</p>
<p>I would say odds are strongly against. My son was 14% in his class with 1390 SAT, in the IB program and graduated high school with 37 hours of college credit from AP and IB and he didn't get in. He did the CAP thing at UTA this year and will be at UT Austin next year. All worked out in the end and taught him a good bit about applying himself and working harder for things that are important to him.</p>
<p>Any of you folks that really want to go to Austin and get capped, I would pass on the encouraging thought that my son's CAP year passed very quickly for him and he is looking forward to heading to Austin next year. While getting CAPped may seem a huge let down, it is a clear path to what you want if you really want to be a Longhorn.</p>
<p>14% isn't bad at all, and seeing as how you registered your location at Plano, that's pretty nice.</p>
<p>CAP IS a huge letdown, because since any in-state student are given it when rejected. So, I sit here and wonder... "Why did I even bother trying in a dozen AP classes and working outside, since I learn much more OUT of class then IN it."</p>
<p>Just throwing this in here, but I'd have to disagree about Nursing being one of the easiest of getting in.</p>
<p>" As of Fall 2007 the School of Nursing had 1005 students, 733 undergraduates (447 pre-nursing, 296 upper-division nursing, 14 RN-BSN) and 248 graduate students (145 Alternate Entry MSN, 51 MSN, 52 PhD).</p>
<p>We graduated 161 new nurses in academic year 2006-2007."</p>
<p>Their admittance rate is pretty competitive as they also have to limit 75% of the open spots to top 10% (top 1%, top 2%, etc. filling up the spots as well). While the rest are thrown into the pile of the other 25% open spots.</p>
<p>robote giraffe -Check out UT's catalog on their website. Read the admissions sections for various departments. Some of the majors are so-called restricted majors. My daughter was looking through the website and saw a statement that essentially said the restricted majors were not bound by the 10% rule: being in the top 10% may get you in to UT but not that major. Conversely, you do not have to be in the top 10% to be accepted in to that major. </p>
<p>My D goes to a small central TX school. The graduating class has about 25-30 kids. Four were accepted to UT this year. That means that 1 or 2 of these were not in the top 10. I suppose her school could be considered O.K., but it is probably not on par with some of the schools described above. Admissions for the class of 2008 were spread among 4-5 Texas schools, including Rice x 3and UT x 4, Duke, UChicago, Northwestern, Georgetown, Yale, UPenn, Princeton, Wm & Mary, and a few small NE LAC's.</p>
<p>Every other college has the same policy. BUT there are fewer applicants per place for Nursing (technically pre-nursing I think) than for most other colleges.</p>
<p>If those are the schools your daughters class is going to, then they either had an amazing class or the school is amazing at college guidance.</p>
<p>is Biology major population @ UT Austin small?</p>
<p>No, I'm pretty sure it's second behind Undeclared Liberal Arts in terms of numbers.</p>
<p>Lost of kids start out as Pre-Med and Bio majors, then realize they can't do the science work and leave. Lots of freshmen.</p>
<p>theloneranger - college guidance is very good. All junios must take a full year of College Preparatory Seminar. This covers SAT prep, application stategy and essays, interviewing, etc. My D is a sophomore. The above represents the class of 08, but most years are similar.</p>
<p>The top ten percent law looks like it's going to change soon:</p>
<p>Still has to pass the house, but I think it will. Good for all sides.</p>
<p>I don't understand how this would work...</p>
<p>
[quote]
Under the Senate bill: Colleges could decide to admit no more than 60 percent of students under the top 10 percent law. The first 50 percent would be admitted based solely on class rank, starting with the top 1 percent, then top 2 percent and so on until all spaces are filled. The next 10 percent of the freshman class would also come from the group of students who qualified under the class-rank law, but for those students the school could consider other factors, such as extracurricular activities or race.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>It doesn't matter, because he is posting an article from last year.</p>
<p>That was from the 80th session, which was in Spring 2007. The senate okayed the law, but the House of Representatives did not even hear the bill on the floor. Unless a special session is called by Rick Perry (he wouldn't risk it specifically for the top ten law because he does not want to offend any potential 2010 voters and because he's an Aggie and wouldn't care if UT wanted it changed), the legislature won't consider the matter until the 81st regular session in January 2009. Any change would be too late to affect admissions for the Fall 2009 admissions cycle, but instead the Fall 2010 cycle.</p>
<p>The law is saying that, for 50% of the spaces, rank alone would be considered, starting with the highest ranked kids. So everyone who was in the top one percent would be admitted, then the top two percent, and so on. Likely for UT this would see the top 7% or so automatically admitted. Then, another 10% of the spaces would still be guaranteed only for top 10% students. However, instead of being admitted by rank, those who were 7-10% would be evaluated using holistic criteria, and they could fill those places. Rougly 20-25% of the top ten kids would fail to receive a place under these criteria, and would instead be considered in the general applicant pool for the remaining 40% of the available places.</p>
<p>
[quote]
another 10% of the spaces would still be guaranteed only for top 10% students. However, instead of being admitted by rank, those who were 7-10% would be evaluated using holistic criteria, and they could fill those places. Rougly 25% of the top ten kids would fail to receive a place under these criteria, and would instead be considered in the general applicant pool for the remaining 40% of the available places
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Thanks. That is an interesting way to do it.</p>
<p>And yes, I see, that news story is from 05/05/07...</p>
<p>Here is the hypothetical admissions scenario using the Senate Bill from 2007, which will likely be resurrected identically next session.</p>
<p>About 25,000 students apply to the university for 12,000 places each year. Currently, 94% of the places are awarded to Texans, and 81% of those are top ten admits. So around 9150 top ten students are admitted, 2150 non-top ten students are admitted, and 750 out-of-state students are admitted (that's an overestimate by 50 total, but you get the point).</p>
<p>Under the proposed law, 25,000 students would still apply for 12,000 places. 9150 top ten students still would have applied for those places, but only 7200 would be guaranteed. Assuming that the top ten applicants were even distributed by percentile (915 for each percentage point), then the top 6.5% or so would receive places automatically under the new law. 3200 students would not have received automatic places. They compete for 1200 additional places, based on a holistic criteria. The 2000 students (22%) who do not receive a place then go to the general applicant pool.</p>
<p>15,850 not top ten kids applied, and in addition to the 2000 top ten kids who did not get a place, that means that 17,850 people are competing for 4800 places. These kids could be top ten Texas kids, non top ten Texas kids, or out of state kids.</p>
<p>So it opens about 20% more places for non-top ten kids, but top ten kids would still be able to compete for those places.</p>
<p>Personally I think a flat 5-7% cap would be much more fair if instituted, so at least those kids who want automatic admission know exactly what they need to pull it off. But again, I don't think any change is necessary.</p>
<p>good luck because you'll need it.
UT DOESN'T take into account of the difficulty of your class (which is totally F'ed up) and DOESN'T take into account of the difficulty or reputation of your school. My school is by far the hardest in our district and I take difficult classes. While I wasn't in top 10, I had some luck next to me. On the other hand, I can't say the same for others. People ranked 11% who got into UC Berkeley, Vanderbilt, UCLA all got rejected by UT Austin, which is also totally F'ed up. While UT is not as prestigious, but it is surprinsingly hard for the level of education it provides (not saying it's not good, but rather that it is overrly hard for its level). On the other hand, people in easier schools easily get in with horrible stats. Our district works on a 6.0 scale and I have a GPA over 5 while someone in the same district, taking easier classes has a 4.6 GPA ranked in the top 5%. </p>
<p>I'll be one who'll tell you that I have the most F'ed up college results ever. Got into University of Michigan (no..., I'm NOT a minority), UI-Urbana Champ, UW-Seattle, UM-College Park, UT-Austin, but got WAITLISTED by A&M. I'm telling ya, Texas is REALLY random.</p>
<p>^
Yeah well, UT doesn't view anyone holistically, just get your rank up, and that's it.</p>
<p>No one told me about the top 10 percent law until junior year, so, my loss.</p>
<p>By yeah, good job getting in though, someone in my class was barely in the top 25% and got it.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t worry, because you could always apply to the honors programs, because the honors programs accepts kids that are not in the top 10%, that’s how my family friend got into UT</p>
<p>everybody says that UT is really good, but if you look at it in more depth, the undergraduate classes have 1:300 ratio sometimes and i heard the dorms are disgusting
again, if you pick honors classes, you have options of better dorms and probably better classes (i am not sure about the classes, guessing)</p>