@Riversider - many of the Ivy schools have 3% RD rates. I am looking mainly at the blended number of ED/RD, which is what I predicted to be 8.4%. It is entirely possible because of size limitations - Rice just can’t have another situation like the class of 2021 unless they expand housing, which is not easy because of layout and structure of the residential colleges.
Pomona went to 6.9% overall acceptance rate last year, simply because of ever increasing numbers of applicants and very few seats. That’s lower than or equal to many of the Ivies.
After I wrote the post, I wondered whether it was possible that Rice would accept even fewer RD. With 408 accepted ED, that means about 400 will actually commit. So that’s max 600 spots left, and more than likely Rice will set a goal for the class of 930-975. I think the variable that could increase the yield this year is that Rice could possibly be a much better deal than many of its peer schools (with the new Rice Investment in play), particularly for families with income in the 120-200k range with typical assets. If a student can get aid for half tuition from Rice, and full pay from Vanderbilt or Wash U - the Rice offer looks pretty great.
When the new Sid Richardson is built, the plan is to use the old Sid for graduate housing. I have heard no plans at all for a new residential college or expansion of the undergraduate student body. Rice expanded the student body from about 650 per class to about 950-1000 per class in the early 2000s - a brilliant move, although it was met with a lot of resistance from many alumni.
I have a logistics question re Owl Week in August, 2019. What day of the week does it normally start, and how long should parents plan to stay? Are there activities for parents during part/all of that week? Thanks!
Rice starts a bit later this year than in the past - O-Week (Orientation week) is starts on Sunday, August 18 and ends on August 24, 2019.
We are from out of state, and we arrived in Houston on Friday and spent Saturday doing errands. On Sunday morning, the residential college that your student is assigned to has a move in schedule that differs by college, but typically has staggered times for move in based on floor. Typically the times are from 8-11 or so. The move-in process is amazing - the upperclassmen student advisors are there to meet the students, take their stuff up to their rooms, and generally greet them with an incredible amount of excitement and enthusiasm! Here is a video from 2018: https://youtu.be/bBOTr77oTGI
There is a lunch in the colleges for the families, and the students are whisked away by their O-week advisors and the parents stay for a panel discussion by the magisters (the heads of the college) and the resident associates. It was actually a wonderful way to leave our daughter - I felt that she was truly part of something special and I loved that she was part of the Rice family from the first moments on campus.
After the parent meeting in the colleges, there is an afternoon gathering for the parents with a speech from the President of Rice and some other people including a current parent. I thought it was quite good and I am glad we stayed for it. We left on a 6pm flight out of Houston on Sunday evening. Parents are required to leave campus in the afternoon, and they are strongly encouraged not to visit their students that first week (truthfully, not allowed unless there is an emergency). This is their time to learn about Rice, meet new friends, and adjust to life in college.
This pretty much means that there will be no time to go out to Target or the store after you drop your student off - your student will need to come prepared. But after sending two kids to college, the one piece of advice I have is that less is more. Your student does not need much stuff! At the end of O-week, the advisors and/or students who have cars will be taking people on Target runs, and there is a Rice shuttle that goes to Target on the weekends. The mail and package delivery system at Rice is wonderful and it is very easy for the students to order stuff on Amazon.
And here is a short blurb on the family orientation: New Families Orientation (NFO) is on Sunday, August 12th, 2018, immediately following move-in. There is no charge for parents to attend this session. Please note that the student program begins that afternoon around 1 pm and all parents are asked to leave campus by 6:30 pm on the August 12th.
Thanks @DCCAWAMIIAIL! Also, important to note is that parents DO NOT go to matriculation. This is a student event. There will be lots of pictures and a video of the event. This is the time to let your new Owl fly!
Hello all! Please bear with me, I might not even be asking he right questions. We finally got the financial awards package for our daughter today. Our total aid is a little more than $7K with about $6K in grant and no scholarships. We are about $100K-$130K with typical asset family. I guess my question is how does the Rice Investment play into this? One of the reason that we ED with Rice was to take advantage of the Rice Investment initiative. Our understanding right now is that we are due to pay cost of attendance minus $7K for next year, or are we missing something?
You aren’t missing anything, but you always have the option to speak with someone from Rice’s financial aid office if you feel your child’s financial aid offer is inadequate.
@jmeryllman Did you run the net price calculator on Rice’s web site? Does the financial award match the calculation you get there? Get Rice financial aid on the phone, or go in person if you are local, to walk you through what it considers “typical assets” and how it arrived at the figures in your student’s award. Rice does not want to lose a student it admitted ED for financial reasons. Rice may be factoring in such things as savings, home equity, retirement accounts that don’t “qualify,” income from a business, etc.
@Faulkner1897 Colleges with <5% rate have name recognition, media support, sports allure, alumni folklore and traditionally popular locations. Rice may be as good as those schools in academics and have happiest environment, still Rice usually get serious applicants, no gaggles of unqualified dewy eyed Ivy hopefuls flocking towards them … yet.
As more applicants are discovering Rice’s academics/improved aid/merit as well as increasing prosperity/liberalism in Texas, it’s only a matter of couple of admission cycles until Rice starts competing with Stanford, U Chicago and MIT for knocking more Ivies out of top 10 on all ranking lists. I’m not convinced this year is their best year ever but it will be a great year. We will find out in few weeks.
I hear you @Riversider and get it. Rice is more of a self selecting type of school - it’s not a school that top students nationwide will automatically include on their list (although in Texas, it probably is).
What will drive the acceptance rate down is that the number of spots is pretty fixed (950-1000 per class). Rice can’t buy an apartment building like University of Chicago to house extra students - the residential college system is fundamental to the Rice experience, and there are only a certain number of spots in the colleges. Yield has a huge impact too, and traditionally the yield at Rice is lower than the ones with the <5% acceptance rate, which is what keeps the acceptance rate higher.
It will be fascinating to see what the numbers are when they are released in April!
You are right, small enrollment, undergrad focus, valuing academic merit, and residential college experience is their strength, they should keep it even if they have to sacrifice higher ranking. It’s not worth it.
@jmeryllman Did you get more info from FA? Your situation is exactly that which strikes fear in my heart. My D’s first choice is Rice (OOS) and there’s boost to her chances with ED, but we need significant aid and I fear even the FA calculator might not be accurate as your case sounds like it doesn’t match the general policy. So many things could fall under atypical assets and certainly in expensive areas where folks are house poor. I wonder if there’s a way to get a stronger pre-read on exact numbers before applying and will ask FA about that when D visits, else RD it is even if the accept rate is lower – better to be rejected than to have to back out of ED, I guess.
@CalDreamin Yes, I have submitted a letter of appeal, and we are expecting a reply in 1-2 weeks. Our main fault is that we did not understand what “typical asset” means. We have our work income, some savings, 401K, a house, with mortgage, way under the median in our zip code, 2 cars are our assets. However, it seems that the calculations got us way over $200K (I don’t know what the formula is), thus not eligible for Rice Investment. Hopefully we can get some relief through appeal.
Going ED because we got lured by the “Rice Investment” is becoming to be our biggest regret. We feel a little helpless right now. We are stuck with no options. We did use the cost calculator online, but we did it before the announcement for Rice Investment. My ignorance and naivete were our biggest mistake, I thought the Rice Investment initiative would help us out.
@jmeryllman - Thank you for posting as it will help other families, but I’m sorry you are going through this. I’m sure it is extremely stressful. When you did the net price calculator, how did that compare with what you were offered? Did your child end up submitting other applications as back up? Best of luck with the appeal.
@jmeryllman Get Rice to walk you through how it applied the formula. Perhaps Rice is missing something or you can provide more helpful information. In case the ED route won’t work out financially, some schools are still accepting applications until 2/1including Trinity, Baylor, TCU, U of Houston. SMU might consider a late app. Your student would be a shoo in at most of these places and might get a lot of merit $.
Did you apply ED before they released the new NPC? It came out like the day after the Rice Investment announcement. I had already run ours and the new formulas didn’t help us much. We ultimately decided we didn’t want to ED, so we are still waiting for RD. (But since then daughter was accepted to Honors at UT, so she may choose that instead. Is much cheaper for us.)
But your numbers are interesting because the NPC was showing 40k for us. So almost down to half price. We have a higher income than you listed (more like 180) but we do have a family size of 7, which helps. Also, we do not have a ton of assets. Do you have a lot of equity in your home? Your 401k won’t count, but home equity will. A rental property perhaps? Fully funded 529s? Do you think you possibly make a mistake?
Why don’t you run the NPC right now and compare? That might be helpful.