I’m trying to figure out safeties, matches and reaches for my junior D and I was wondering how accurate the “prepscholar” chances calculator is? The only way to reach it (that I’ve found) is to Google “prepscholar (college name)”. There doesn’t seem to be a master page that links to all the colleges.
With my D’s stats of ACT 32 and 4.4w/3.96uw GPA the calculator predicts the following chances
(I used the 4.4 GPA because the slider allowed it):
U Chicago 3.81%
Haverford 44.37%
Middlebury 51.25%
Vassar 60.97%
Pitzer 72.26%
Reed 83.52%
Smith 88.37%
Whitman 95.89%
Of course it doesn’t take into account any other factors, so I don’t know if these are accurate chances. She’s unhooked, caucasian from CA, primary EC is theater with lead roles, top 10% of class of 100 students, no class ranking.
If they seem accurate, what percentage cutoffs would you feel constitute safety/match/reach?
Maybe:
Safety = 90% and up
Match = 50-90%
Reach = under 50%?
Her small school only sends the tippy top of each class to top-ranked colleges, which she is, so the Naviance data is very slim. Plus there are a lot of URM’s and 1st Gen at her HS, which are not reflected on Naviance.
Or how else do you guys figure out safety/match/reaches? Possibly using the common data set’s range of accepted ACT scores, how many are top 10% of class and above 3.75 GPA? Acceptance rate for females? Or are these what the preschooler chances calculator is using?
I tried various online chancing calculators when D16 was applying. I found them overly optimistic. The competition gets worse every year and they are working off of data from previous years.
Looking at the list of colleges, I think the calculator is off. They are all selective. They are all holistic when it comes to admissions. Liberal arts colleges are also very small, so they don’t take a large number of applicants to begin with, then you have to factor in the things that each is looking for, if they think it’s a fit, etc. This all goes beyond grades and test scores. When we were looking for my D, I also thought the online sites looked way too optimistic. I think they work much better for large universities, especially ones that pretty much just choose their class by their stats. All these LACs reject plenty of kids who are in the right stats range. I don’t mean to be a downer, and usually with a list like this a student who is in the right stats range will get into some of the schools on their list, but I’ve also seen the rare case when that doesn’t happen. Our college counselor told all the parents that for an unhooked applicant with high stats any college with an admissions rate at 25% or below was a “reach for everyone” college. And that “likelies” could be found in the colleges that accepted quite a bit more than half their applicants. Hope this helps.
Yes, those are optimistic. Using Reed as an example, stats only count for 20-25% of admission (my D had a similar GPA and a 34 ACT and was waitlisted). I used CDS data for our school evals.
@mamabear16 That’s sadly what I was worried about.
@Erin’s Dad Oh geez! Can you explain how you used the CDS data? I have a massive spreadsheet going and I’m trying to make sense of this all.
Alternatively, how many of these types of LACs do you think she should have on her list for at least one to come through for her? I think she will interview well, so that may help as well.
@craspedia , do you have Naviance access at your school? There’s no statistical prediction that can be guaranteed but that is probably your best bet.
It does get less valuable at the elite colleges. On ours, the scattergrams for HYPSM look like Jackson Pollock painted them with only his right hand while running out of green paint.
@postmodern Yes, we do have Naviance, but it’s such a small school and so few kids apply to selective colleges that it’s there are hardly any data points for these schools. The majority apply (and attend) UC’s. The best data from the above schools is that Whitman looks like a guaranteed safety. And 2 kids applied and got into Middlebury last year who have lower stats (though one was a URM). The Middlebury acceptances seem strange because they only accept 16% of females who apply, and two of our girls got in! So, maybe she has a decent chance there???
I guess she and I will discuss this lack of data, and that she will probably need to have a longer list in order to increase her chances.
Naviance is helpful, but also is missing some date (as in, which of these accepted students were legacies, URMs, athletes, etc.) Whitman looks at fit - this was discussed at length in an admissions session we went to on campus. Does your D think she fits in there? If she does and she has the stats needed I think it’s at least a match (I always hesitate to say safety if unhooked), especially if they know her school.
If you look at the common data set for these schools, I think you can assess the test scores and see how your D fits into who is accepted. I think anything below 50% makes it hard, and I preferred being above the 75th percentile. Grades are harder since they really vary from HS to HS. That’s where Naviance really does come in handy, since you can see what they think is acceptable from your school.
It’s really difficult to place these schools into easy categories since their admissions processes are so holistic. I didn’t take an overly optimistic view when going through this with my D… some people may tell you that she has a great chance at some of these.
If you want some “similar” schools with somewhat better admissions chances I would suggest looking at Bryn Mawr, Scripps, and U Puget Sound.
Out of curiosity, I looked at the Naviance data for those colleges from my kid’s school. Obviously the stats won’t translate directly to your daughter, but the data does at least allow some generalizations about the relative difficulty of getting into those schools. Chicago and Vassar had the highest avg. GPA/SAT scores, followed relatively closely by Haverford. Middlebury and Smith were close to each other in the next tranche down, and then Pitzer, Reed, and Whitman were all grouped near each other (though take that with a grain of salt as not that many kids from the East Coast apply to those schools).
Based on her list of schools, here are some others that you might want to consider as giving her a decent shot at getting in (none of these are “safeties” in the sense of having 50%+ admission rates, but are all less selective than U. of Chicago, etc). If she likes Haverford and is willing to look at a girls’ school (which I assume she is since Smith is on the list), then I’d strongly encourage a look at Bryn Mawr. It’s siginificantly easier to get into than Haverford, only a few minutes away, and she can take classes at Haverford. If she’s interested in LACs, then I’d suggest a look at Grinnell and Macalester. My son’s college counselor highly recommended those two as “likelies” for him, in part because they tend to be overlooked by kids from both coasts. There’s also Oberlin, which is somewhat harder to get into than Grinnell or Macalester, but her interest in theater would help there.
@craspedia I used CDS and other published data from the college’s own admissions office website to make rough approximations of my children’s chances. In my daughter’s case those stats weren’t terribly telling b/c she applied to art schools and the portfolio was the most important criterion for admission. In my son’s case, we looked for colleges in which his stats (GPA and test scores) were in the top 25% of enrolled students from the previous year. As it happened he got admitted to every college he applied to except one – and that one was so super selective in terms of % of admits per applicant that we weren’t surprised by the result.
For highly selective and smaller colleges, in which admission was likely to be much more than just a numbers game, we also looked for “fit” based on the college’s programs and the student’s special talents and demonstrated achievements in school-related activities (individual awards, honors, championships, etc. – in art, journalism, math, debate, and other areas).
Of course the kids have their own tastes for colleges based on programs, location, size, public vs. private, and other factors. In the end, because of these tastes – not statistics – our daughter only applied to art schools that were located in/near cities in the East. Her test scores clearly put her in the top quartile of enrolled students, but it was just a guessing game on our part how her artistic talent would be evaluated. However, she attended a couple of “National Portfolio Day” sessions near where we live, and she got some great feedback from college representatives that helped her to improve her portfolio. Fortunately, she was admitted to all the schools she applied to.
Well understood. But that is the result of more applications per student, right? Hasn’t the number of students remained very similar over that time?
If the number of total college bound students is the same and the number of college enrollments are the same, then statistically it is no more difficult to get accepted. It may seem that greater numbers may make it more difficult to predict an individual applicant – but larger sample sizes make for more accurate data, so theoretically it is the same or easier.
I do understand there has been an increase in international acceptances which may make for a slight pressure on the overall cohort.
Please note I am not saying it is easy. It definitely isn’t! Just that the bar for admission has not really risen for individuals over that time period.
@soxmom Thanks, Grinnell and Macalester (and Carleton) are all on her radar… We may do a midwest trip to see these schools, and our skimpy Naviance data looks hopeful for them as well. Not sure what she thinks of Oberlin. She is relying heavily on the Princeton Review book.
She’s coming from an all-girls high school, so she knows the value of an all-girls education, but it may be time to add in boys so she has more of a sense of the real-world. So for that, I think being able to easily cross-register at Haverford would be great! And likewise, attending Scripps, but having very easy access to the other Claremont Colleges.
I think she has a lot of great options, I’m really excited to start visiting these schools with her next year
OP, L&C is a good choice. My younger D went there and loved it.
As far as how to use the CDS info, look at section C7 to see what weight different info gets for admission, then look at the GPAs, class rank, scores. We didn’t do it formulaically (though I think someone on the site has done something like that) but to get a general idea. Both Ds were waitlisted at one school (and both their #1 choice, of course) and made it into their other 4. Then just comparing aid offers and talking through what each really wanted.
I’m guessing that you are in CA (you mention UCs being popular for kids from your D’s HS) and if so, I do think it helps to be looking at these LACs that are OOS. Even though at every college talk we went to it was mentioned that many, many applicants were from CA, I still think it helps to give kids a little “geographic diversity” bump in the midwest and the east coast (or at least that is what our Naviance showed).
Is your D a junior? You mention she is at a small school. Mine was, too, and in that case talking to the school’s college counselor can be helpful (more than Naviance if it has only a few data points).
ETA: L&C, Wilammette, and UPS all looked like safeties from our Naviance.
Every year is a new year. Every year brings different applicants. Every year has its own competitive native.
Ther could be trends…but the reality is…at any college, you have no way to predict the strength of the applicant pool, or the number from year to year.
