Financial Aid and Acceptance Rates

Hey everyone!
So, I heard a piece of advice earlier and I was wondering if you
If you’re applying to a school without financial aid, your chances double. If you’re applying with financial aid, your chances are cut in half. Meaning if a school had an acceptance rate of 20% and you didn’t need FA, your chances are 40%, and if you do, your chance is 10%.
Is there any truth in this?
Thanks!

According to @GMTPlus7 , who has parsed more data on boarding schools than anyone else I’ve encountered on CC, yes.

I’m sure there is truth to this. But truthfully these acceptance statistics are so meaningless. The only meaningful thing is how likely are YOU to get in. A straight A 99% SSAT score from New Mexico or Nebraska is going to have a much greater shot than a B student with an 80% on the stats from NY, Mass, CT etc.

Even at Andover and Exeter I would guarantee you that the accept rate is higher than the posted rates if you take out everyone who scores below a 90% or has below a 3.5 GPA, I’m not saying they never get in but the odds go up as your package is stronger.

For law schools they used to publish a matrix for each school. It was great you could put in your LSAT score and your GPA and get a personalized acceptance percentage

When I went to Exeter this fall, I was told by a non admissions related employee that financial aid hurts your chances a lot unless you have an amazing application

I’m surprised that about 43% of kids at Exeter are on FA… But Exeter does have a pretty large endowment.