<p>Northwestern</a> Markets Chicago to Receive Record 30,605 Student Applications - Bloomberg</p>
<p>We had more ED applications, a lower ED acceptance rate and still managed more ED acceptances (further reducing the availability of RD seats in the class of 2015). </p>
<p>If projected RD yield is at all similar to last year (and increased selectivity suggests our yield will be same or better than yrs past), then NU is looking at a FANTASTIC year in terms of hard admissions statistics.</p>
<p>It may a stressful time to be an applicant but it is an exciting time to be a student and a very proud time to be an alumni!</p>
<p>2025/30605 = 6.6% acceptance rate? When adjusted for yield, I’m guessing… 10-15%? </p>
<p>Ick. :(</p>
<p>The smaller class size worries me, although it doesn’t seem as if it will be drastically smaller. They might admit 50 students less AT MOST. Also, the increased applications are just attributed to an increased population of high school students year after year.</p>
<p>You guys suck at math. The acceptance rate will be around 20%.</p>
<p>Northwestern’s yield will be about 33% again. Even though NU over-admitted for ED to artificially raise overall yield, the RD yield will be lower this year since NU’s been losing the prestige game to its competitors more and more over the past few years. (Don’t believe me? Do the math. NU’s yield has remained the same, despite admitted more ED every year. This means the institution is losing more of its cross-admits in RD.)</p>
<p>This means that NU will admit about 2025/.33 = 6136 applicants. Which means that the acceptance rate will be 6136/30605 = 20.05%. At the very lowest, it could drop to 19%, but I don’t expect that to happen.</p>
<p>That being said, this is obviously a very good year for NU admissions. Although I would like to see NU actually try to win its cross-admits, rather than artificially keeping its yield by accepting more and more ED students each year. Especially since you know, ED obviously gives rich kids a huge advantage.</p>
<p>I challenge the assertion it’s been losing the prestige game. It’s begun competing with higher end applicants, as the stats of the class have improved and NU has gained in the rankings. But the effect is that it’s harder competition, so equivalent yield. My guess is the yield will be higher this year.</p>
<p>I would hate to be an applicant this year. If NU is your first choice, better apply ED!</p>
<p>For a class size of 2,000, NU is more impressive with a 20% acceptance rate than other schools in its range than have similar acceptance rates with significantly smaller classes. It’s also simply harder to fill a class with more people while keeping stats up at the same time.</p>
<p>Phuriku, if you’re going to say that ED gives an advantage to the rich, that doesn’t mean it doesn’t also give an advantage to the poor. With rich kids with high stats admitted, more low-income students (esp if they have lower stats) can be admitted as well.</p>
<p>Also, just because a school has no binding early option doesn’t mean it will level the level the playing field for all applicants. Poor students will still have to compete with rich, typically higher stats applicants whether EA or RD. Admissions might be forced to take more of the latter to keep their stats high, while poor students who don’t get a boost from ED might fall to the wayside. Furthermore, many schools are need-blind yet don’t get a generous financial aid package to those they admitted, making it much harder for middle-class and below students to attend. Luckily, NU’s financial aid policy is generous across the board.</p>
<p>I think increasing the % of class admitted ED can be very beneficial for the University and students (of any background) alike.</p>
<p>ED is used at most schools to mine the field for speical admits, frequently diversity candidates. Some like UPenn and WashU are notorious for playing games to inflate their selectivity rankings in usnwr [even stanford some say plays games with harvard yale likely cross admits]. I’d hate to think that NU is playing those games too.</p>
<p>It’s interesting how phuriku would often sound bitter and try to **** on the parade whenever there’s good news for NU.</p>
<p>Mia, all schools are now playing the strategy games. Everybody wants record-numbers of applicants and lower acceptance rates. You would be remiss not to acknowledge that. But you’re right that some schools play it more than others. Those schools have found it’s a win-win situation for them, and that’s why they keep doing it. They give underresourced students a precious opportunity to succeed while those students contribute to the school’s diversity of background and life perspectives.</p>
<p>I’ve actually stopped calling Phuriku out on that because I know he will keep doing it no matter what. It demonstrates a severe lack of social tact. We all have different means to make ourselves feel good-- it’s just that most of us have more things going for us than academics and the stats of our school. For Phuriku, these things are everything so sometimes, I just “give it to him so to speak,” lol.</p>
<p>I doubt other students at UChicago are this obsessive, whether on CC or in real life.</p>
<p>^You are right.</p>
<p>EA is just another strategy other schools use. EA may not yield over 90% like ED does but its yield is definitely higher than RD; at the same time, EA pool is usually significantly larger than ED because of its non-binding feature. In the end, EA probably gives the school as much bump to its overall yield as ED does, if not more. Chicago is not all that pure either, ms. phuriku. You are too naive if you think EA isn’t a “game”.</p>
<p>Phuriku (is she perhaps behind the uchicagoreject.com? - although this would require a sense of humor) may have a small chip on her shoulder but her numbers seem reasonable. </p>
<p>However, her assessment that a stationary yield indicates “NU’s been losing the prestige game to its competitors more and more over the past few years.” is obviously made without any qualifying support and likely not a conclusion that can be drawn from the limited data available. And on the surface, a university with double digit rises in ED applications and RD applications; going from 16,000 applicants in 2005 to over 30,000 this year would seem to support an argument for waxing prestige rather than waning.</p>
<p>Anecdotally it appears the admissions standards are getting to be increasingly difficult at NU. I realize this is baiting (but hopefully prompts some thoughtful exchange) and purely subjective but I believe that the US News & WR ratings, and a concerted effort by NU admissions to expand on their ratings and capitalize on their academic prowess have placed Northwestern firmly in the same applicant pool as ELITE TIER (B) schools (aka IVY League rejects) in the coveted university “prestige” rankings:</p>
<p>ELITE TIER (A) schools (aka “Shock and Awe” schools)
Names that have become emblazoned upon our public consciousness as the epitome of elite.</p>
<p>Harvard
Yale
Princeton
Stanford
MIT</p>
<p>ELITE TIER (B) schools (aka IVY League rejects)
Name recognition gives sufficient awe to warrant acceptance for over-achievers.</p>
<p>Penn
Columbia
Brown
Duke
Northwestern
Dartmouth
Caltech
Cornell
Georgetown
University of Chicago (borderline)
UC Berkley (borderline)
Notre Dame (perhaps in danger of dropping into Tier C due to lack of diversity in admissions)</p>
<p>ELITE TIER (C) schools
Very elite schools but without always same nationwide status (this says more about publics lack of knowledge then any reflection on academic standing)</p>
<p>John Hopkins
Carnegie Mellon
Vanderbilt
Rice
Washington U
WestPoint
Annapolis
UCLA
USC
Univ of Michigan
Emory
Tufts
some LAS colleges including Amherst, Williams, Swarthmore
Univ of Illinois
Univ of Wisconsin
etc, etc</p>
<p>It appears that NU is firmly in the same applicant pool as the top desired universities and extrapolating projections for future acceptance rates, I would not want to be in my younger brother’s shoes (hes currently an 8th grader with heart set on Northwestern or Brown at moment).</p>
<p>^^ Prestige is a relative thing. There’s a limited amount of college prestige available, and colleges have to fight with each other over it. NU’s admissions rate has gone down what, 10% in the last 10 years? In comparison to other schools (esp. Chicago, where the admission rate has gone from 70% to 15% in the last 15 years), NU is doing very poorly and is clearly losing the prestige battle. Of course, it’s the job of a university to keep its alumni motivated, which is why you’re confused about the supposed rising prestige of NU. The alumni of any school possess this misconception.</p>
<p>The schools that NU is supposed to be competing against (JHU, Duke are two) are still beating NU in admissions numbers fairly easily, despite NU’s recent rises. That anyone would classify NU as competing with the Ivies for applicants is absurd, since NU’s yield is in the low 30s. Does any other elite school have that yield, outside Hopkins and Wash U? At least Chicago’s yield is on par with Duke and Georgetown and Caltech, but that’s fitting because EA schools have inevitably smaller yields than ED schools. That a supposedly elite ED school still doesn’t have yield on par with Georgetown, Chicago, and Caltech, three elite EA schools, is just sad.</p>
<p>Sorry, I’m just trying to provide an objective perspective. I would actually like NU to succeed (if only it would lose its unjustly-gained superiority complex - that any NU student would rank NU with its 8 Nobel prizes ahead of Chicago with its 85 Nobel prizes, is just laughable), since Chicago loses many professors due to the fact that there aren’t any other Ivy-par institutions in the Midwest outside UC.</p>
<p>Anyway, you really think I’m that obsessive about this? Just look at how many posts I make on CC… very few lately. And plus, I don’t even care about what happens in the US. I’m off to Asia next year, where Chicago’s extremely well-known and no one knows what the hell Northwestern even is. The reason I’m ****ed off about this isn’t that it’s NU in particular. It’s because NU and other institutions like JHU and Duke think that they can over-admit ED and thereby lower their admissions rate artificially, which CLEARLY gives an advantage to upper-class students. As someone from a poor family, I think this is outrageously unethical, and so I’m bound to hate the admissions process of these schools, as well as those students who support these institutions without considering the harm that it’s doing to class relations.</p>
<p>Phuriku says:</p>
<h2>"Sorry, I’m just trying to provide an objective perspective. "</h2>
<p>Atleast you gave me a good chuckle in your response :D</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I’m sorry what was that? I fell asleep.</p>
<p>Phuriku, I wouldn’t tout your poor class background for dramatic effect if I were you, since it puts you in no better position to make a case for ED. I’m a huge advocate of class equality myself, but I support ED for various reasons. While ED gives a boost to richer applicants, you can’t dismiss the possibility that it also gives a boost to the poor in 3 ways: the higher stats locked in from rich applicants in the ED pool allows the university to admit lower-stat poor kids and keep the figures at bay; these poor kids can apply ED to get a boost AND be guaranteed a generous FA package (it’s the middle class that are really hurt but even they have a lot of aid available); if ED is used more aggressively, selectivity will go up, and the school will be able to attract and enroll more low-income applicants.</p>
<p>If UChicago is known nationally or internationally, it doesn’t always have a good reputation. Northwestern’s social cachet is stronger and much more positive. And yes, needless to say, Northwestern is just as well-known on a national and global scale as well.</p>