<p>I am more conservative in my estimates than many here but my equation is: If a student is in the middle of the admitted student stats and the school has an acceptance rate of 50-60% or greater I would say it is a match. If your student is in the top 25% stats wise the school is a safety.</p>
<p>To me any school that has less than a 50% admit rate is on the reachy side unless the student is squarely in the top 25% and then at best it’s a match.</p>
<p>I do know this is a more conservative estimate than many used but my thought is it is better to be truely safe than truly sorry come May 1.</p>
<p>“let’s not turn a “safety” into something it was never intended to be”</p>
<p>Too many kids and parents on this site never consider finances until it’s too late. I would join a usually vocal minority on this site in urging all to consider finances and fit, as well as chances of admission, when defining safety schools.</p>
<p>If your kid’s GPA is 3.8 and SAT is 2350…and he/she applies to a school where the middle 50% has a GPA of 3.0 and SAT of 1900, and that school admits 60% of its applicants…it would likely be considered a safety for your kid. But, if your EFC is higher than the COA, but you can’t/won’t pay your EFC (and the school gives little to no merit aid), or if the school is in the cornfields of Nebraska and your kid thrives on bright lights big city – the classical “definition” of safety is meaningless.</p>
<p>Our school doesn’t subscribe to Naviance, so I was happy to learn of other sites that aggregate data. However, plugging my daughter’s stats into the mychance site and the pr0wler site, I got very different results. For example, looking at one school, she had roughly 50% chance on one site and a better than 98% chance on the other. One site pretty much didn’t think ANYTHING was a safety, while the other gave us the impression every school on her list was a lock.</p>
<p>Obviously, I don’t want to be over-confident, but being overly-discouraged isn’t a good situation, either. </p>
<p>Anyone have a sense of which site is closer to the truth?</p>
<p>Obviously the difference between 50 and 98 percent chance is huge. What school is it? No offense intended, but I’m guessing that off-the-charts difference may simply be because you mucked up one of the key inputs at one of the sites. It happens. </p>
<p>Another suggestion for those in school systems that don’t use Naviance is to use data from a peer school in your area. Many allow guest access and even those with passwords can be easily determined (often it’s simply “guest” or the school’s nickname or (more directly) simply call the school’s guidance dept. and ask what it is. The beauty of Naviance is getting away from averages and more toward results. A case in point is Boston University. A kid who has a certain G.P.A. and SAT score would seem to be an easy meet or even a safety at BU - but he’s not. Easily 35 kids will apply from our local school with many IVY or top 20 school bound kids using it as a safety school. BU is only going to accept so many from our school each year making the G.P.A. and SAT range much higher than their average admit. Parents/students need to know those sort of things.</p>
<p>Believe it or not a small number of us don’t have peer schools. Our public has: fewer than 500 students, Title 1, avg parent education is a high school diploma plus a few months of CC or trade school. We send about a 5th or fewer of each graduating class to 4 year schools and that exceeds by far any of the other schools in our area. </p>
<p>Absent Naviance and peer schools [Free</a> College Search | Scholarships | College Admissions Requirements](<a href=“http://www.collegeboard.com%5DFree”>http://www.collegeboard.com) is the best option I have found for figuring chances. You can also find COA and avg % of need met on their site as well as accept rates. Use their “How do I Stack Up” feature and it will show where your/you student’s stats fall in relation to the current freshman class.</p>