<p>I think it will be hard for Rapelye to replicate that yield and admit rate without (1) greater resort to the waitlist, (2) a return to Freddie-style "strategic admissions", or both.</p>
<p>The larger the RD pool, the more likely there is overlap with competitors, and it will harder to identify that overlap group for purposes of shunning it.</p>
<p>The techniques I would use (if I were she) would be to (1) look long and hard at the ED-deferreds, who will presumably enroll at a higher rate since Princeton was their "first love", (2) go light on the RD admissions,and cherry-pick the waitlist. (There are all kinds of "legitimate" reasons for doing this), and (3) go crazy with "likely letters" to feel people out; if the recipients respond favorably, you can count them as "in" and reduce the otherwise-necessary number of RD admits accordingly.</p>
<p>If she takes my advice, Rapelye might be able to goose the yield back to 71-72%, even while seeking more of the ballet dancers, fine arts majors and 1,600-scorers she pines for.</p>
<p>She does not need to Mr. B. Haven't you heard? The word is spreading far and wide (despite a lack of marketing) that if you want a top flight education in an institution that has a TOTAL undergraduate focus, Princeton is the place to be. That, in the end, is the Princeton trump card.</p>
<p>I think the fact remains that the sheer increase in the # of applicants is not anything related to marketing, it's just because of the common and online apps. If you disregard those applicants, the overall trend should be the same as last year. So us real applicants shouldn't have a lot of trouble.... (I hope)</p>
<p>uggh, i don't get what the big deal is about all these artsy-shmartsy ppl! Rapelye needs to get off the artsy ppl, diss the sciency ppl, and recruit HUMANITIES PPL (like myself :D) ....i mean, come on...what's more interesting than Near Eastern Studies??? Theology, NES, and History are all inter-related...think of the possibilities!!!! THINK OF THE INTELLECTUALITY!!!! what more could she want?</p>
<p>Princeton suffered a huge, anomolous drop last year - primarily because it got lost in all the sturm and drang about early admissions changes elsewhere.</p>
<p>Basically, it has now returned to where it was for the class of 2007. The 2009 app numbers are actually up only 2.2% from the 2007 numbers. </p>
<p>There were 15,726 apps for 2007 vs the current 16,007 apps for 2009 - even with the helpful switch to the common app for the Class of 2009.</p>
<p>I can compare college admissions with American Idol. If a particular singer does really well one week, the next week, people won't be so worried about him or her and they won't vote in mass droves. If a singer does absolutely horribly and places in the bottom 2 or 3, the voting public often votes a lot for him or her the next week to "save" him/her from getting voted off the next day, regardless of performance. This is how it works with colleges. Last year Princeton dropped a whole lot, so people thought it would be easy to get in this year and applied in droves (record #'s); whereas at Yale last year there was a massacre, so this year people weren't quite as excited as they were at Harvard and the numbers fell slightly. It's all strategic. Next year Princeton will probably have a slighly lower number of applications again, and Harvard will probably have a slightly lower or at least steady number as well, whereas Yale will probably go up again.</p>
<p>Again a negative spin Mr. B. That year and this year reflected big surges. The diference is that the strength of this year's surge is likely to remain because the acceptance of the common app will continue. So you are not looking to a return to an average but a return to a peak year.
The only fly in the ointment is, as I stated before, that Princeton develops a reputation similar to ITT (that it is impossible to get into). That might cause people to back off. However this can all be overcome with an effective marketing plan. In fact, if a quality plan is put into effect, next year, these numbers might surge again.</p>
<p>If Rapelye wants another surge in apps, all she has to do is to flash her trump card "Princeton, the home of TOTAL Undergraduate Focus."</p>
<p>" The larger the RD pool, the more likely there is overlap with competitors, and it will harder to identify that overlap group for purposes of shunning it. "</p>
<p>So for that reason, I think they will play it safe and admit a large percentage of the high-scoring ED deferred applicants.</p>
<p>
[quote]
might as well go buy myself a lottery ticket
[/quote]
Well, how coincidental - I just turned 18 last Friday! I'm off to buy myself some college lottery tickets now... Great odds on this one. ;)</p>
<p>Hey now... let's not diss on the sciency people... and by that I mean math people, diss on the Engineers all you want... but especially no dissing when they're of the feminine persuasion, because we are awesome and few and far between.</p>
<p>semp, arent u a california girl? why not ucla or uc berkeley? tulane is all the way in "norlens" :D hehe, much more fun when u say norlens instead of new orleans</p>
<p>even if they do admit a large number of students i think byerly is right that for the RD round around 7%ish will be accepted at the most. i dont think it will get much higher than that</p>