<p>Why would BU experience such an increase?</p>
<p>At both BC and BU, this will create headaches for adcoms in predicting the yield rate. Each school could end up underenrolled and have to go to the waitlist, or overenrolled and have a campus housing crunch, among other problems.</p>
<p>I heard BU did a lot more marketing this year or something.</p>
<p>^ They did.</p>
<p>The BC prompts:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>St. Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Society of Jesus, encouraged his followers to live their lives in the service of others. How do you plan to serve others in your future endeavors? </p></li>
<li><p>From David McCullough’s recent commencement address at BC: </p></li>
</ol>
<p>“Facts alone are never enough. Facts rarely if ever have any soul. In writing or trying to understand history one may have all manner of ‘data,’ and miss the point. One can have all the facts and miss the truth. It can be like the old piano teacher’s lament to her student, 'I hear all the notes, but I hear no music.” </p>
<p>Tell us about a time you had all of the facts but missed the meaning. </p>
<ol>
<li>In his novel, Let the Great World Spin, Colum McCann writes: </li>
</ol>
<p>“We seldom know what we’re hearing when we hear something for the first time, but one thing is certain: we hear it as we will never hear it again. We return to the moment to experience it, I suppose, but we can never really find it, only its memory, the faintest imprint of what it really was, what it meant.” </p>
<p>Tell us about something you heard or experienced for the first time and how the years since have affected your perception of that moment. </p>
<ol>
<li>Boston College has a First-Year Convocation program that includes the reading and discussion of a common book that explores Jesuit ideals, community service and learning. If you were to select the book for your Convocation, what would you choose and why?</li>
</ol>
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<p>And this would be a bad thing?</p>
<p>BC is a Catholic school.</p>
<p>If they budgeted for the same number of applicants as last year, they have to make up nearly $700K (9051 x $75 application fee)</p>
<p>My guess is that they didn’t budget as much money. I mean, BC was previously known as “that school with no essay” by many students. I, in fact, looked for schools with no essay, and BC popped up each time. I ended up applying because I realized the essay was for one easy, and two, I realized that I would genuinely consider going to the school if I got accepted.</p>
<p>Without a doubt, BC will admit fewer students this year.</p>
<p>i guessed notre dame(teo’o), whoops, close enough</p>
<p>
Actually I think it’s exactly the opposite of what you wrote. This is the essay they will pay the most attention to! The reason is this essay can only be used for BC. For a student that really wants to go there, they’ll spend as much time on this as they did on the essays that go everywhere. It’s the student that has BC way down on their list that will rush through the job. So by looking carefully at this essay BC can separate one group from the other.</p>
<p>BC should have had an essay from the start. That would have ensured that only serious applicants applied, and would have protected the yield. With the addition of the essays, BC will suffer a slight setback in terms of applicant numbers, but it will immediately benefit from a higher yield. I do not anticipate a big drop in acceptance rates.</p>
<p>Maybe not a “big drop” …but surely a drop in the acceptance rate that is commensurate with the expected rise in yield.</p>
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<p>Exactly. Applicants tend to spend untold hours polishing their personal statement, but then rush through the short-answer questions. It readily becomes apparent who spends time on the latter.</p>
<p>I thought it might have been because they are in the ACC.</p>
<p>For Penn State, seeing Pitt’s numbers this year would clear up some of those theories. </p>
<p>I read somewhere that OOS apps are really down, and I think those are very much affected by the Sandusky scandal. The lustre is really off of PSU as a result. My son had it on the top of his list, and now he is luke warm about the whole thing. His highschool had a drop of such apps as well some others here, and the bad press did contribute. </p>
<p>For those in PA, however, PSU and Pitt and Temple are the three big state school choices. If I lived there, I would press for my kids to apply to all three schools if they had the stats for them, because they probably are the best bang for the bucks without going into the merit money lottery. Paying another 10K to go to a like school OOS is a $40K decision over the course a kid’s time at college, at least. When the acceptances come rolling in PSU will see who does come .</p>
<p>BC… I don’t know. How are the apps this year at Villanova, Fordham, Holy Cross and Georgetown, BU and other like schools? If that essay requriement really did put the quash on the apps, I think it will be going away. This will affect ratings for next year.</p>
<p>@cptofthehouse BU, for one, reported a 19% rise in applications.</p>
<p>Wow, it’s crazy that just changing one essay makes such a HUGE difference, but I guess it makes sense - BC is a hard school, so it’s one a lot of students could just add to the common app without much work. This is good for everyone who applied!</p>
<p>CPT - I would agree with you about Penn State. I think the scandal really hurt the appeal for OOS students, and that is understandable. IS students have fewer options. If I were OOS, I would not choose Penn State, especially given its high tuition. And I say that as an alumni who really likes the place!</p>
<p>According to a NYTimes article the Univ. of California system received a large rise in applications. The California State University system received a 7% rise in applications.</p>
<p>Applications were down 3% for Dartmouth.</p>