How many colleges is your child applying to?

Parents Forum
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<p>Jamimom, as usual, I read your posts with awe and amazement. My "to do before I die" list certainly must include taking you to coffee someday!! Of course, that's assuming you can fly in your brother-in-law to police the zoo while we're out.</p>

<p>I will be very amazed if my daughter ends up with more than six college applications. She has very clear-cut ideas about what she likes and doesn't like and so far has been exceedingly, annoyingly picky about schools. Even something like a stray piece of trash blowing across the lawn seems to be a reason to automatically discard a school that otherwise seems OK in my mind. I can't imagine how we would ever be able to find 15 schools that she'd deem acceptable to apply to!</p>

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<p>Jamimom, welcome back. I would love to hear how the audition went if you are willing. My D heard from her girlfriend who was at it as well.
Susan</p>

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<p>"I'm starting to believe that applying to 20 schools (or even more than 10) is an indicator of someone who has not done the proper research (i.e. matched their specific interests, desires and eligibility criteria to schools' specific offerings and acceptance realities)."</p>

<p>My daughter's list of 11 schools is indeed based on a whole lot of research. She is, however, a flexible person and therefore can see herself being happy both at a school like Brown without any requirements and at a school like Columbia with its core curriculum. That's one reason her list is as long at it is. Some of her criteria are pretty much non-negotiable: no more than a certain percentage of students who go Greek, no school where the school spirit is heavily invested in football; no schools in Maryland or D.C. :-( But she doesn't care if it's an urban or a suburban or even a rural campus as long as there are enough non-alcohol based campus events and as long as there's a museum somewhere in the vicinity. It would have been a shorter list had she stuck with her original assertion that she'd never go to a women's college, but she became flexible about that too.</p>

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<p>I think that is a very common strategy. Kind of the college app version of the Vegas lament, "I lost my house at the craps table, but the next roll of the dice will be the lucky one."</p>

<p>Personally, I think applying to eight reach schools is exactly what's wrong with the application process right now. Too many apps, too little self-selection.</p>

<p>IMO, the college selection process should have a "win-win" outcome. Who the heck wants to go to the mailbox eight days in a row and get rejection letters?</p>

<p>The bulk of the schools should be matches (for non-hook, non-URM kids, that means SATs at the 75th percentile level). Throw in a reach or two (SAT's below the 75th percentile) dream schools and give it your best shot. Instead of wasting time on eight shotgun reach school apps, work the dream school app hard: visits, learning about the school, etc.</p>

<p>I guess you could make the argument that applying to eight schools increases the odds of good financial aid. But, honestly, if you are maximizing financial aid, you shouldn't be focusing on reach schools.</p>

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<p>I don't think 8 schools is unreasonable. Especially if you are looking in the NE part of the country where many schools seem similar, it makes sense to apply to schools where you are equally interested as their finaid packages may be quite different.
My daughter only applied to 5 schools, but she did include a reach and the offer from her reach was attractive enough to attend. Don't give up your reach schools, you never know :)</p>

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<p>InterestedDad ... you said:</p>

<p>*** The bulk of the schools should be matches (for non-hook, non-URM kids, that means SATs at the 75th percentile level). Throw in a reach or two (SAT's below the 75th percentile) dream schools and give it your best shot. Instead of wasting time on eight shotgun reach school apps, work the dream school app hard: visits, learning about the school, etc. ***</p>

<p>I agree that this works for many, but certainly not for all. Stated differently, it makes perfect sense conceptually, and in theory reduces the need to apply to 10-12 schools, but I think it doesn't work when one is talking about Ivies, Ivy-like schools, and the top-tier of LAC's. For instance, assume a student is well over the 75th percentile in standardized test scores and class-rank, perhaps at a level which would be at least the school's 90th percentile, and further assume this student is otherwise well qualified (excellent EC's, recs, essays, application), BUT, this student is a non-hook, non-URM kid with a domicile that is a dime-a-dozen, well that student can be said to be a "match" in terms of qualifications, but because of the admissions practices of these top schools and the overwhelming odds against, such a student must always consider admission to this kind of school a reach. Nobody, well virtually nobody, can consider HYP, ASW, Stanford, MIT, or even schools like WUSTL, Brown, and Dartmouth to be matches. My point? Just this: If such a student has identified a bunch of top schools that legitimately meet her interests (i.e., she isn't applying based on some misguided notion of prestige), then it's perfectly valid to apply to 8, 10, 12 of these schools to maximize the chance that even 3-4 will come through with admits and she can thereafter, hopefully, have the ability to choose between her very favorite 2 or 3. For such students (many on these CC boards fall into this category), there can be a major gulf between a school a student knows he can be admitted to and a school for which her qualifications deem her a match, but who the heck really knows. It would be a shame to not maximize admit chances for this top group based solely on rigid adherence to an artifial artificial standard (no doubt created for good reasons) dictating the so-called "best" number of schools to apply to.</p>

<p>Everybody's situation is different. And, I haven't even got into the whole issue of being able to compare available financial incentives (a select few of these top schools might have merit money available, while others might have better -- or lesser -- financial aid packages).</p>

<p>I think a good strategy for almost everybody is to design an admission plan that will generate 1 or because of finances perhaps 2 absolute safeties (schools that you'd be "happy" attending) and then it also hopefully generates roughly 4-5 other offers of admission from schools that totally delight you. Then, a student can be in the enviable position of tossing perhaps 2-3 if the offers that interest them the least, and then agonize (because the student did such a good job of selecting schools that truly interested her) over the remaining 2-3, comparing academics, ambience, lifestyles, student body, programs, grad school reputations, AND finances.</p>

<p>I don't believe there was even ONE original thought in this email; just what seems common sense to me and my family. My D will likely be applying to between 10-12 heavily researched schools, 2 safeties and the rest being considered reach/matches of varying degrees.</p>

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<p>
[quote]
Nobody, well virtually nobody, can consider HYP, ASW, Stanford, MIT, or even schools like WUSTL, Brown, and Dartmouth to be matches.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>As you know, I don't include HYPSM in any of my thoughts on college application strategy.</p>

<p>Having said that, I do believe that admissions at Williams, Amherst, Swarthmore, Dartmouth, Brown, Duke, and other similar schools DO behave in a predictable, rational fashion. All of these schools can be viewed as a perfectly reasonable "match" for a student with 75th percentile SATs and a very high class rank. </p>

<p>If you have 1500 SATs, a #1 or #2 class rank, and a quality application package (ECs, essays, etc.), you have a high degree of likelihood of being accepted to most, if not all, of these schools -- i.e. a "match". In that case, applying to four of them as your "match" schools makes sense. However, (allowing for the atypical result), if you are going to get into one of them, you will most likely get into most of them. None of these schools have such strong applicant pools that they turn down 1500 SAT valedictorians with solid application packages. </p>

<p>The reason I don't include HPSYM is that their atypical yield numbers reduce the acceptance rates to miniscule percentages. For all intents and purposes, an 8% acceptance rate is conceptually the same as a 0% acceptance rate. I would also add that not many applicants are at Harvard's 75th percentile stats (a 1580 SAT) required for a "match" by my way of thinking. Thus, almost anyone who applies is down in the "reach" territory where admission will be solely dependent on the exceptional strength of the application in terms of ECs, etc.</p>

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<p>"Having said that, I do believe that admissions at Williams, Amherst, Swarthmore, Dartmouth, Brown, Duke, and other similar schools DO behave in a predictable, rational fashion."
Sorry, InterestedDad but I think you have a slightlier rosier than realistic view, possibly thanks to your D's undoubtedly deserved god fortune in being admitted ED to Swarthmore last year. I would have to concur with DudeDiligence. For a non-URM/non-recruited athlete/non-legacy-development prospect from anything other than a very underrepesented state, applying to 4 or 5 reaches makes a lot of sense as long as they are reaches the student really wants to go to. Certainly on the basis of my own family's experience and those of other students we've known, results at any Ivy and at any most of the top ten LACs (and certainly the top 5) can be quite unpredictable and not necessarily rational, at least not to the normal observer. Samplings from the last few years: in at Williams and Bowdoin, waitlisted at Amherst and Haverford; rejected at Williams, in at Amherst; rejected at Williams, deferred and ultimately rejected at Dartmouth, in at Amherst; deferred ED at Williams, waitlisted RD, and ultimately not admitted despit having been totally supported by school and showing tremendous interest at every stage; waitlisted at Georgetown, in at Columbia after ED deferral. Sure there are some patterns; kids often get in to Bowdoin or Davidson who don't get in to Williams; girls get in to Wellesley who don't get in to Swarthmore; kids get in to Cornell who don't get in to Dartmouth. But clearly, the game just clear-cut anymore, and highly qualified but maintream students can't predict whether their essay or ECs are gong to strike a responsive spark in an admissions officer or committee who is faced with a hundred equally sterling applicants, all from one prosperous metro area, let along so many more from across the country.</p>

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<p>I agree with you Mattsmom where you say that the applicnat pool seems to be getting stronger every yeat and none of the Ivies or Elite LAC are a shoe in for anyone, and what the school is looking for changes each year depending on whatkind of class the school is trying to build. No one is really a shoe in anywhere. Even with the number of ED applications dropping at some of the Ivies, they can still fill a class atleat 10x over with applicants. I just got finished watching the admissions video and saw how very unpredictable the processis. </p>

<p>Kids also change from one year to the next. My daughter applied to 7 schools that she absolutely loved (loved them so much in many ways they were so similiar to one another there was no clear first choice for ED)and had she only gotten in to one would have been very happy. But when the acceptance letters came and she found whe was accepted to all of them, the picture began to change.</p>

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<p>My son applied to eight schools last year only because even his "match" and "safety" schools save one had low acceptance rates. Not as low as the Ivies, but many in the 30-35% range. Even when the applicant is in the 75% range it is hard to treat anything as a match if they take only one in three applicants. He liked each and every one of them, and was able to compare aid packages in April. He did get into all of his schools, but I don't know that he could have repeated this year. You just never know. He was not interested in attending the state unis here. I think he would have applied to fewer if he would have been happy with an auto admit in the bag.</p>

<p>My class of 09 kid also applied to eight for the same reasons.</p>

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<p>Just to be clear: I take an exceptionally realistic view of "matches" and "reaches". When I say that Williams, Amherst, Swat, Brown, and Dartmouth are "matches", I am talking about a student that has 75th percentile SATs and a very top class rank (1st or 2nd from a normal high school, top 5 from a magnet school) AND solid ECs.</p>

<p>I did NOT view Swat as a "match" for my daughter because she lacked the 75th percentile test scores (1530 at Swat). However, everything else on her app met the criteria, so I felt like it was a reasonable "reach".</p>

<p>I'm not making my "predictable" assertion based on my daughter. But, rather a much larger group of students I know here and elsewhere who got accepted at Williams, Swat, Brown, Dartmouth, Duke, etc. Their SATs ranged from the mid-1400s on up. But, what they all had in common were top class ranks: public schoolers who were 1st out of 200, 2nd out of 225, 4th out of 400, etc. BTW, most of these were from "horrible" states as far as competition: Massachusetts and California. None were URMs or legacies or recruited athletes.</p>

<p>The most common miscalculation I see here on CC is underestimating the importance of class rank. I see a lot of kids with class ranks that are really marginal for their schools. For example, Swarthmore is a reach regardless of test scores unless the class rank is very high. Top 10% might be good enough from Exeter, but not from most public high schools.</p>

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<p>ID ,</p>

<p>My daughter went to a school that does not rank. While many collegs say that rank is second to grades in importance, at many of the colleges almost almost 50% of the hisgh school don't supply rank.</p>

<p>You stated:
"Their SATs ranged from the mid-1400s on up. But, what they all had in common were top class ranks: public schoolers who were 1st out of 200, 2nd out of 225, 4th out of 400, etc. BTW, most of these were from "horrible" states as far as competition
Massachusetts and California. "</p>

<p>I am a little confused, horrible in what respect? In the quality of education in those states, or horrible because so many students are applying to the same group of schools.</p>

<p>I know at Dartmouth after NY, the largest group of freshmen are froom CA, and MA</p>

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<p>
[quote]
I know at Dartmouth after NY, the largest group of freshmen are froom CA, and MA

[/quote]
</p>

<p>That's what I meant by "horrible". IMO, being from California, NY, MA, or a couple of other locations is a disadvantage in elite college admissions because the applicant pools from these states are so large.</p>

<p>BTW, when I say "class rank", I am refering to a group of techniques colleges use for evaluating a student relative to the other students as his or her high school AND factoring the quality of the high school. The colleges can figure it out, even for schools that claim not to rank. They also can figure out what GPA at Exeter is the equivalent to a salutatorian at a public high school.</p>

<p>There is some "x" class rank at each type of school that is an accepted cutoff at places like Swat, Dartmouth, etc. "X" can be determined by looking at the admissions book at the particular high school.</p>

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<p>ID:</p>

<p>I don't really disagree with anything you've said, but I think we might be emphasizing slightly different things.</p>

<p>In our immediate circle of friends/relatives over the past two years (for the sake of simplicity, let's assume that all have solid enough EC's, recs, essays, and apps -- and they've also demonstrated interest (for those schools that seem to require this too) -- we know the kids and families and have every reason that this assumption is valid):</p>

<p>-6/500, 1550 SAT: rolling admission IN at Michigan; counselor wanted to convince family that their son would definitely get into at least 2 out of H, Y, and S; family more conservative so student applied to H, Y, S, P, and Rice; DENIED at H, Y, S, P ... IN at Rice.</p>

<p>-8/1100, 1580 SAT: DENIED at H, and P; waitlisted at WUSTL (and this student showed serious interest in WUSTL -- so-called Tuft's syndrome??); IN RD at Y (in the difficult Yale massacre year).</p>

<p>-4/300, 1520 SAT: DENIED Brown, Dartmouth, Williams, Amherst; IN at Princeton and Stanford.</p>

<p>This is obviously just a random sampling and is apropo of very little. None of these kids were vals, but all of the kids presented overall packages that were better than 75th percentile level at every school with the possible exception of Harvard. Even so, I think some of the results were surprising and I find it difficult to say that they could be considered "predictable" to the applicant (and that's the only level where predictability has any meaning).</p>

<p>Since my D's profile (4-6 out of 400; high 34 ((because of rounding)) on the ACT) is very good, but not a "no brainer" (truly, is anybody's? ever?), we really do think it's prudent to approach the relative unpredictability by playing things conservatively -- applying to 3-4 more schools she likes than she would in a more perfect world -- and see where the admissions offers AND FINANCIAL OFFERS come in.</p>

<p>Given her situation (not to mention our financial concerns), I think it would be a disservice to her one time only undergraduate application search to limit these high-end reach/matches, match/reaches, or whatever we want to call them, to just 2 or 3. If we did that, I'm afraid we'd have a lot of family worry time about possible regrets, while if we err on the side of being too conservative, she simply has a lot of work (but she'd know she did everything SHE could).</p>

<p>Again, I think we're saying largely the same things, just emphasizing different parts of this tricky landscape.</p>

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<p>InterestedDad wrote:
"Having said that, I do believe that admissions at Williams, Amherst, Swarthmore, Dartmouth, Brown, Duke, and other similar schools DO behave in a predictable, rational fashion. All of these schools can be viewed as a perfectly reasonable "match" for a student with 75th percentile SATs and a very high class rank. </p>

<p>If you have 1500 SATs, a #1 or #2 class rank, and a quality application package (ECs, essays, etc.), you have a high degree of likelihood of being accepted to most, if not all, of these schools -- i.e. a "match". "</p>

<p>I don't quite agree with you that these schools are a Match for any kind of student or that it is predictable. </p>

<p>Going by your criteria of the 1500 SAT and ranked first or second in the class.....</p>

<p>I can't speak of each school's stats on that list but I will take Brown since my D goes there. Last year, Brown admitted 26.9% of applicants who scored over 750 on the Verbal and 26.1% who scored over 750 on the Math. They accepted 35 % of vals and 31% of sals. Of those ranked in the top five kids in the class (not top five percent), they accepted 30%. I realize this is not combining the SAT figures with the rank but often those who have such a rank also have SATs in this ballpark. I would not call these admit rates predictable or a match. Albeit they beat the overall 15% admit rates. </p>

<p>Susan</p>

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<p>I would also agree with Soozie in that a kid with high scores, top rank and the typical "plays tennis/accomplished piano player, volunteers three days a week in a nursing home, homeless shelter, AIDS clinic" (take your pick) has a slightly higher but not stratsopheric chance at many of the schools you guys have been talking about. The problem is that in his/her town, this kid is the cream of the crop... especially if the SAT's are creeping towards 1550 and if teachers are writing "this is the best student I've ever taught in 15 years of high school ". These are the kids winning the local awards, giving speeches at the Kiwanis club and Junior Achievement who everyone thinks is a shoe-in at Brown or Yale.</p>

<p>Well-- when you've got Olympic skaters and Chopin competition winners and the Physics Olympiad winner from Nepal as your competition, your local Star may or may not make the cut. The only thing a kid can't control for is the quality of the rest of the applicant pool- the great unknown, so if a kid has the energy to apply broadly without diluting the quality of the essays and without jeapordizing their school work, it makes sense for the garden variety smart kid to be skeptical of the "stats". There may only be 100 true "superstars" in the applicant pool.... but assuming that Yale and Brown are smart enough to figure out who these world class students are out a pool of thousands, you've just taken 100 spots off the table even before the legacies, athletes, and other special categories are considered.</p>

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<p>ID, I am going to take Dartmouth since my daughter attends </p>

<p>In the end I believe that no one can really predict a student's chances because of the subjective criteria used in selecting a class.</p>

<p>According to Dartmouth's Office of Institutional Research:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.dartmouth.edu/%7Eoir/pdfs/cds_2003-04.pdf%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.dartmouth.edu/~oir/pdfs/cds_2003-04.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>For Academic Year 2003-04 (the class of 07 Class of 08 information has not yet been released)</p>

<p>1216 ED applicants
397 Admitted</p>

<p>Relative importance of each of the following academic and nonacademic factors in your first-time, first-year, degree-seeking (freshman) admission decisions.</p>

<p>Very Important- Academic (in the order they list them)</p>

<p>School Record
Class Rank
Recommendations
Test scores
Essays</p>

<p>Non Academic</p>

<p>Interview - Considered
EC's - Ver Important
Talent / Ability- Important
Character personality traits- Very Important
Volunteer Work- Important</p>

<p>Percent and number of first-time, first-year (freshman) students enrolled in fall 2003 who submitted national standardized (SAT/ACT) test scores. Include information for ALL enrolled, degree-seeking, first-time, first-year (freshman) students who submitted test scores. Do not include partial test scores (e.g., mathematics scores but not verbal for a category of students) or combine other standardized test results (such as TOEFL) in this item. SAT scores should be recentered scores. The 25th percentile is the score that 25 percent scored at or below; the 75th percentile score is the one that 25 percent scored at or above. </p>

<p>25th Percentile 1330 27 ACT
75th Percentile 1540 33 ACT</p>

<p>Percent submitting SAT scores 90.4 Number submitting SAT scores 974 </p>

<p>Percent submitting ACT scores 9.6 Number submitting ACT scores 103 </p>

<p>Percent of first-time, first-year (freshman) students with scores in each range:
SAT I Verbal Math
700-800 61.5 63.4 (so, 61% scored between 1400-1600)</p>

<p>600-699 29.9 28.9 </p>

<p>500-599 8.1 7.2 </p>

<p>400-499 0.5 0.4</p>

<p>ONLY 53.1% OF THE SCHOOLS SUBMITTED RANK</p>

<p>Average GPA 3.66</p>

<p>Percent of students who submitted GPA 43.1</p>

<p>The net-net is this :</p>

<p>Some of the 1600 uberstudnets will get rejected</p>

<p>Some of the people who feel that they come off as just being regular folk will be accepted </p>

<p>in the end it is all about BUILDING A DIVERSE CLASS.</p>

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<p>I'm not a parent, I'm applying myself now, but my list stands at 17. However, I refuse to apply to all of them. My absolute limit is 10, so I'm working hard on tryng to determine which schools I like less than others (I put a thread on the selection section called "help me narrow down my list" explaining further). I think its ok to be interested in many schools, but applying to all of them seems silly. Also, when everyone applies to 20 schools, each school becomes so much harder to be accepted to, as it receives so many more applications. Hopefully, I'll get in early, and will end up having applied to one school only. Wouldn't that be nice? :)</p>