<p>^ Exactly. Those starting this year would be of the Class of 2012.</p>
<p>I guess the thread means High School Class of 2012</p>
<p>Surely the thread title is referring to high school class of 2008 (college class of 2012 at most colleges).</p>
<p>Another factor is that the number of students accepted at major colleges is not increasing, but decreasing. For example, the state of Florida is mandating budget cuts and this resulted in FSU taking significantly fewer students this year than in the past. </p>
<p>There are also universities that exceeded their projected yields last year that plan to offer admission to fewer students this year and make use of wait lists. It would be interesting to know if there are schools planning to increase their capacity in the next few years. I don't think construction of new dorms necessarily means increasing capacity, since in many cases they are replacements.</p>
<p>All I can say is thank goodness for early and rolling admissions! It's so hard to predict how regular decision will go this year.</p>
<p>I was definately talking about the high school class of 2008. These articles are alarming. I wonder how it will be in lets say 10 years. What if almost all applicants are qualified and they start going by lottery? That would be insane!</p>
<p>Got into Michigan OOS. Can't really ask for more.</p>
<p>In addition to the increased competitiveness of college admissions, imagine the increased financial implications. My math teacher told my class that when her youngest (currently four) graduates high school, it's been predicted that his college tuition would be about $80,000 a year.</p>
<p>$320,000 thats insane! The government needs to start kicking in!</p>
<p>2009 is the worst.</p>
<p>
[quote]
The government needs to start kicking in!
[/quote]
</p>
<p>The government does kick in a lot, and that's one reason that many families sign up for colleges that have such high list prices: they know they won't be out-of-pocket for the whole list price.</p>
<p>true token but even if the government does help people $320,000+ will still be too much! Soon only the wealthy will be able to receive an education!! UH OO</p>
<p>I have read that the peak in U.S. high school graduates will occur with the high school graduating classes of 2011, 2012 & 2013. Applications are also up due to the widespread acceptance & use of the common application. USNews &WR rankings have created an application frenzy to the top ranked schools that probably will not recede anytime soon--if ever. Early admissions options,i.e. EA & ED, have injected some sanity into the college application process.</p>
<p>CA budget cuts for college = all bad.</p>
<p>when did CA decide they would be cutting the budget?
Never heard that</p>
<p>everyone applies to too many freaking schools. i only applied to 6, but my friends to 16!!! yep, all my teachers say that this year (hs class '08) is the worst, the peek, for college admissions.</p>
<p>I am not sure this year is anymore competitive than in the past:</p>
<p>In my public HS the top 25 students usually are very well informed
about their relative chances at their school choices and keep it down to
5-6 colleges. The rest (at least this year) seem intent on wasting
money and not doing adequate research. </p>
<p>Our GCs are usually on top of things and try to help the situation but when
they tell someone "UCB OOS for EECS is up there"- the rational ones get it
and figure out their chances and the rest just apply anyway - the popualr
word used is "crapshoot"- meaning it might happen! </p>
<p>Selectivity in terms of acceptance stats is not a good measure of competition.
If you apply to UCS EECS OOS with a GPA at the bottom
quartile and not get accepted it is still going to register as one applicant
not accepted; not as 1 applicant who did not have a chance but decided to
blow $60 got rejected. </p>
<p>The stats are getting inflated; the swelling of the ranks simply a result
of the college brands taking over our sanity ;)</p>
<p>Good point arwen15.</p>
<p>while i do agree with arwen on some points, there IS statistical evidence that there is a larger number of students applying to college this year (thanks to the fact that many of our parents were born during the baby boom).</p>
<p>also, i go to a public magnet school where most people are generally well-informed (i daresay even obsessive?) about college admissions... and the average number of schools each student applied to is 15. there are also many cases in my school of top students who have already been accepted to their dream colleges (i.e. Yale, Stanford, MIT, UChicago, Rice) applying to a lot of other top schools to see if they can get more money and/or just to see if they can get in.</p>
<p>obviously, it's rather annoying for those of us who are still waiting to hear from our top choices....but what can we do?</p>
<p>
[quote]
Second, colleges in the United States accept applications from all over the world, so it is quite possible that demographic trends in the United States will not be the main influence on how many students apply to college. The cohorts of high-school-age students are still increasing in size in some countries (NOT most of Europe).
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I don't think that the demographic trends overseas will influence U.S. college selectivity for U.S. students. Most U.S. colleges, esp. the competitive ones, have quotas for the numbers of international students they accept each year. So, even if more international students apply this year than ever before, it will only make the international applicant pool more competitive, but this will not influence the pool of domestic applicants.</p>
<p>"I don't think that the demographic trends overseas will influence U.S. college selectivity for U.S. students."</p>
<p>I dont know about that. International students, particularly Asians, are sending more and more students over to study engineering and computer science; so I do think it will be a huge factor. At the end of the day, universities want the most qualified students, and if they happen to be international, I don' think they would hesitate to give admissions.</p>