OK.
But I think we all agree that college admissions below the top tier are not getting more competitive, and probably are getting less competitive for many reasons (including finances).
But at the high end, it is as competitive as ever. And finances don’t seem to be lessening competition at this level.
We don’t have agreement on the definition of “top tier” so I am not sure how we could have agreement that admissions below the top tier are not getting competitive. I guess we could define “top tier” as those schools for which admissions are not getting more competitive (however that is defined) and everything else is below “top tier” and thus below top tier admissions are not getting more competitive. Though that would seem silly even for this site.
So I disagree with your “we all agree” statement. But judging by the discussions in this thread and elsewhere (including in the elite definition thread) I just have no interest pursuing it further.
The reality is that admission to college is pretty non-competitive at all but a small number of universities. People tend to focus on these universities but most students attend their local state universities.
As for top-tier universities, admissions is becoming exceptionally competitive not only because of the sheer numbers involved but also because there no longer is a “formula” that guarantees admission. Indeed, just trawl through the hundreds of posts from students with stellar grades and test scores who are rejected or WL. The fact not “intangibles” count for so much is what makes the process so competitive.
Regarding the most selective colleges:
Once an applicant has the baseline top-end academic stats (top-end GPA and rank in hard HS courses, top-end test scores), most of the rest of the distinguishing characteristics are difficult for the applicants to observe and compare, since applicants and most others outside the college admission offices do not have a view of how a given applicant compares to the rest of the applicant pool. For example:
In other words, admission to the most selective colleges looks like a lottery or random chance from outside the admissions office, even though it is not from the point of view inside the admissions office. It also means that students and others tend to exaggerate the importance of attributes that one either has or does not, like legacy, race/ethnicity, or gender.
Not only that, but the quality of essays and recommendations can vary tremendously based on the judgement of the individual reader. One readers top 10% percent essay may be seen as middle of the road by other readers.
Also the quality of the essay is not an absolute; it is judged in comparison with the quality of other essays in that years application pool, as well as a comparison with those in prior years application pools. UChicago seems to have about 50 or so admissions counselors. They are charged with reviewing 30,000 applications, or about 600 applications each. They will be familiar with the essays written in their pool, but not the essays outside their pool. Given that the pools are frequently geographic in nature, areas with strong essay writers may be penalized because applicants are compared to others in their region and not across regions.
They are also mentally judging this years applications with essays written in prior years. There is so much variability in this system that the outcome will resemble a random walk.
@Zinhead When I worked in college admissions what really mattered was when there was something in an application that really stood out, that made the candidate memorable. It was generally very easy to distinguish between the student who held a number of “leadership” roles just to pad out their application and those who were really distinguishing themselves in some way.
Essays were also important as, along with references, they occasionally revealed something that Adcom’s found to be very significant, i.e. a unique situation or challenge the candidate surmounted, an unusual skill, an interesting dimension to the candidate. Each year I would make literally dozens of calls to college counselors to discuss these things as a result of a comment made in an essay, recommendation or interview report. And often these “revelations” played a major role in the positive decision the student ultimately received.
“Memorable” and concerns about “padding” are the stuff of College Confidential, the default advice from posters not sure what goes on.
Same for the “unique situations” or context that CC loves to tell kids to promote.
Those are superficials. They are not what defines a compelling applicant from the get-go. There are many expectations a tippy top can set, beginning with how a kid thinks, has acted through the hs years (as reflected in choices made and commitments) and how he or she chooses to pull the self presentation together in the app package.
So students and others may well do that. But without information (which we do not have) as to the influence of those factors, claims of exaggeration cannot be verified. Or if true, to what degree.
@lookingforward You may be right but we most definitely DID consider context and unique situations in the two Ivy Group universities I worked for. That was one of my principal duties as an Associate Admissions Director and the majority of our committee and sub-committee deliberations were devoted to discussing these cases. That said, what most people consider to be “unique” was not what we considered unique, and the same goes for context.
From the perspective of a parent who has now sent three kids to university, both public and private including grad school (and all out-of-state), I think admission to the top colleges and ESPECIALLY flagship state schools has gotten MUCH more competitive over the last eight years (our college-application years). Especially in engineering and business. It’s the smaller private schools that are seeing the decrease in competition.
Some of the engineering schools at state universities require scores that equal or surpass the Ivies, especially if you’re out-of-state. That’s sometimes hard info to find out, though. My child’s own college counselor, at a private school, didn’t even realize this very important fact. He thought an ACT of 34-35 with a math score of 30 would cut it for aerospace at Georgia Tech, but I strongly disagreed. My son studied over the summer and re-took it to get a 33, thank goodness. He was accepted everywhere he applied, but initially deferred at GT.
The decrease in competition is more among the lesser-known private schools, I think. Looking at my son’s class, the tuition discounting is PHENOMENAL (the school publishes scholarships by the name of every graduating senior). I have a hard time believing that some of these schools are going to stay afloat for much longer. But, they can provide a very good education. I’m a big believer in the fact that a great kid is a great kid anywhere and all of these schools have more opportunities than any one student can take advantage of.
I think that there are only a few careers are worth paying full freight at an Ivy for, and engineering isn’t one of them, luckily for me. There are almost no careers worth paying full freight at a “second-tier” private school, in my opinion of course. Again, I really believe the students make the school shine, not the other way around. Take the scholarships where you find them and don’t look back. Have faith in your student, not the school.
@northwesty, I don’t know what you consider “top tier,” but here on CC people usually use that term to refer to a handful of highly selective private universities and LACs, or perhaps those plus an even smaller handful of the most selective publics (UCB, UCLA, UVA, Michigan, UNC Chapel Hill). But by any of those definitions, I think your assertion is demonstrably false.
As I believe I pointed out somewhere upthread, every Big Ten school is more selective now than it was 10 or 20 years ago, in many cases dramatically so. Here are some figures for the University of Minnesota:
Middle 50% ACT:
1996: 22-27
2006: 23-28
2011: 25-30
2016: 26-31
% scoring 30+ on ACT:
1996: 10%
2006: 14%
2011: 28.3%
2016: 38%
% in top 10% of HS class:
1996: 28%
2006: 39%
2011: 44%
2016: 48%
Others are similar. That’s not to say it would be difficult for a top 5% or top 10% student to gain admission to Minnesota, but the types of applicants who would have easily gained admission 20 years ago and would still have had a good chance 10 years ago are now routinely rejected in favor of applicants with stronger academic credentials. This is part of a broader “flight to quality” (or “flight to perceived quality” as some on this thread prefer, though the term originally comes from the investment world where “flight to quality” actually means “flight to perceived quality,” making the addition of “perceived” redundant). Facing a challenging job market, millennials are under more pressure to get into better schools, and that doesn’t only mean the elite privates. It means getting into the state flagship if that’s the best school in the public system. As a consequence, although the total pool of college-bound seniors may not be increasing, more of the best-credentialed students are aiming higher, allowing the better schools to become more selective. We hear all the time from alumni of the University of Minnesota who say their kids are actually better students than they were, but the kid couldn’t get into the U even though the parents had no problem. And it’s the same in many other states. I think a myopic focus on a handful of elite private schools causes many on CC to miss important broader trends in higher education.
@bclintonk - You are not considering the data that was presented in post #229. Between 2012 and 2016, the pool of high (30+) ACT test scores has increased by 47 percent, or a whopping 55,000+ students. Every single school that admitted students with scores more than a 30 will see an increase in the Middle 50% and % scoring 30+ on the ACT due to score inflation, so quoting increased ACT scores as a sign of competitiveness is meaningless.
Come on BC – I think you know what I’m talking about. We’re talking about overall trends from the top to the bottom of the overall market.
Which is things have become more competitive at the “top” and really not so competitive down below. Because the pool is so much bigger today, it is tougher for the 1% kids to get into a top 15-20 school than 10-20 years ago. And tougher for the 5% kids to get into a top 50. And tougher for the 25% kids to get into a top 100.
So I’m not surprised if “The U” has become more competitive as compared to schools that are lower ranked than The U… And that’s a true statement regardless of whether “The U” means UVA (#24) or Miami (#44) or Minnesota (#71).
Everyone is free to define the “top” however you want – top 3/10/25/50/100, whatever. If you are a top 1% kid, Minnesota (41% admit rate) is not very competitive for you. Which is how the discussion on CC tends to roll.
But there’s 2,200 four year colleges in the U.S. So #71 Minnesota is still a “top” school since it is in the top 3% of all colleges. But obviously not a “top” school when being compared to Harvard. But 90-95% of all colleges are pretty non-competitive.
Defining the “top” is kind of like trying define what “rich” is. It is all relative. Your college is a “top” school (and mine is not) if yours is ranked higher than mine. If you have twice as much money as I do, to me you are rich. But you think “rich” only applies to the guy who has twice as much as you. And so on…
@northwesty
There’s a little over 3,000 4 year Universities as of 2012. Just keeping you honest ;).
https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d13/tables/dt13_317.10.asp
You know your 3,000 number includes 782 for-profit four year schools?
I’m sticking with 2200.
Back at you. : )
I think that argument is a non-sequitur, @Zinhead. It’s not “score inflation.” More people are taking the ACT, resulting in more high scores–but also more low scores, so the percentile ranks don’t change that much. In 2011 an ACT score of 30 was top 5% (95th percentile). In 2016, an ACT score of 30 was top 5% (95th percentile). So if a school has an increasing fractional share of its entering class scoring 30+ on the ACT, it means an increasing fractional share of its entering class is in the top 5% on that particular metric. And if it also has an increasing fractional share of its entering class in the top 10% of their HS class, that’s a further indication that the entering class is academically stronger.
And it’s not just about those scoring 30+ on the ACT. Consider the student who scores a 24 on the ACT. In 2001 that score was 76th percentile, and it would have put the student smack in the middle of Minnesota’s entering class. In 2001, a score of 25 would have been 74th percentile—relatively little change there—and it would have put the student just below the 25th percentile of Minnesota’s entering class. In 2016, a score of 24 was 75th percentile—again, little change—and it would have put the student well down in the bottom quartile of Minnesota’s entering class. making the prospects of admission dicey, at best.
Bottom line, in the past you didn’t need to be in the top quartile of college-bound seniors to be admitted to the University of Minnesota. Now you need at least that, and what it takes ratchets a little higher every year. So yes, it’s more competitive.
I think that argument is a non-sequitur, @Zinhead. It’s not “score inflation.” More people are taking the ACT, resulting in more high scores–but also more low scores, so the percentile ranks don’t change that much. In 2011 an ACT score of 30 was top 5% (95th percentile). In 2016, an ACT score of 30 was top 5% (95th percentile). So if a school has an increasing fractional share of its entering class scoring 30+ on the ACT, it means an increasing fractional share of its entering class is in the top 5% on that particular metric. And if it also has an increasing fractional share of its entering class in the top 10% of their HS class, that’s a further indication that the entering class is academically stronger.
And it’s not just about those scoring 30+ on the ACT. Consider the student who scores a 24 on the ACT. In 2001 that score was 76th percentile, and it would have put the student smack in the middle of Minnesota’s entering class. In 2001, a score of 25 would have been 74th percentile—relatively little change there—and it would have put the student just below the 25th percentile of Minnesota’s entering class. In 2016, a score of 24 was 75th percentile—again, little change—and it would have put the student well down in the bottom quartile of Minnesota’s entering class. making the prospects of admission dicey, at best.
Bottom line, in the past you didn’t need to be in the top quartile of college-bound seniors to be admitted to the University of Minnesota. Now you need at least that, and what it takes ratchets a little higher every year. So yes, it’s more competitive.
I’ve been reading along, but haven’t posted until now. The one thing I keep reading in threads about alot of schools, even those not in the top tier. Say the Top 50 roughly. The phrase is “Not as easy getting into as it used to be.”
@bclintonk - In 2012 1,666,017 seniors nationwide took the ACT. In 2016, that number grew to 2,090,342, a 25 percent increase. If there was no score inflation, one would expect the number of students scoring a 30+ would also increase by 25 percent. Instead, in the same time period, the number of students scoring a 30 or more increased by 47 percent, so there definitely has been some change in the curve that inflates the number of high scorers.
As for the fractionally higher share of of the top 10 percent of the class during that time period, UMN could be doing a better job keeping top MN kids in-state that would otherwise go out of state. The increasing cost of private tuition is a good argument that flagship state schools are getting more competitive compared to private institutions, but increasing ACT scores is not necessarily evidence of that because the pool of high scores has inflated.