safety, match, reach, high reach

Parents Forum
1

<p>I've been reading this forum for a long time and yet I still find myself confused as to what constitutes a safety, match, reach and high reach in terms of standardized test scores. My S is soon to be a rising senior, so the definitions of these have taken on a new importance. I find myself looking at college stats and thinking that if he is at the 75%ile of SAT/ACT scores they are matches for him. Is this being too conservative? Or would schools where he is at around the 50%ile be matches? When does the acceptance rate come into play? Would being at the 75%ile at a 30% acceptance rate school be a match, but the same percentile at a 20% acceptance rate school be a reach? What is the difference between a reach and a high reach? I find the advice often given "everything is a reach in this competitive environment" not helpful, because we really don't want to spend $1,000 on application fees if we can help it.</p>

<p>As you can see, I am still confused and any help would be appreciated.</p>

2

<p>ilsa, I'd like to see someone explain that, too.</p>

<p>And I've always taken the "every school is a reach this year" as more of a cautionary tale for the heart than practical advice for applications.</p>

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<p>Well, it's not all about test scores, but I did look at those %age figures in combination with acceptance rates to guess about my son's "chances". Actually, at a certain point, one is above the 75%ile for every school, so then it's more about acceptance rates, along with GPA, class rank, EC's, geography, hooks, etc. It is pretty complicated.</p>

<p>My son applied to 10 schools all over the country, with AR's ranging from below 20% to high 60%. The ones accepting 60% or more we considered safe, the ones in the 40's and 50's we considered matches and below 40% AR, we considered them reaches. He probably had one high reach, a school that accepted under 20%. To me, those schools are reaches for everyone.</p>

<p>Stay tuned and you'll get an earful on this. To add to the safety, having some EA and/or rolling admissions schools is great. My son's 2 safest schools had EA, so he knew he was accepted to 2 good schools before January.</p>

4

<p>Find out if his school has naviance. This is a service that tracks acceptance/rejection/waitlist information for his school. The service only takes into account SAT scores and GPA. A section shows scattergrams with GPA on the Y axis and SAT on the X axis. If they offer naviance, get an ID and look there. Factor the results down a little if your son will not be a recruited athlete, is not a legancy, etc. It's not the perfect resource either, but it's better than trying to gauge things based on SAT alone.</p>

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<p>No his school doesn't have Naviance, unfortunately. Nor are the guidance counselors helpful. The problem I see is that schools accepting 40-50% usually have the majority of their kids with scores (and gpa's, class ranks) below his (around 95% gpa, top 7% class rank, decent ec's, awaiting final junior year stats and May SAT scores). So these may be matches acceptance-wise, but are they matches ability-wise? Most schools where he is at the 75%ile seem to have about a 30% accept rate, which bethievt calls a reach. There seem to be acceptance-matches and ability-matches, then, and ability-matches are actually reaches?</p>

6

<p>Yes, students with high SATs and high GPAs with difficult courses and good ec's will often be matched to reach schools. Sorry, I don't know how to advise you. I'm a parent '10, so I'm going up the learning curve. Just 3 thoughts:</p>

<ol>
<li><p>There are far more qualified applicants than there are places for them in the most competitive schools.</p></li>
<li><p>Many colleges accept a range of abilities, so your son would find similar classmates at many schools. I think the most competitive schools have a tighter range of abilities & level of achievements. </p></li>
<li><p>As I'm sure you know, it's very competitive right now. If I were in your situation, I would be top heavy with reaches on my list -- do not think of them as matches. However, I would select the matches and safeties very carefully. I think the hardest work is selecting these well. I wish I could give you a formula for calculating what would be a match or a safety, but I don't have one. </p></li>
</ol>

<p>Good luck!</p>

7

<p>OP's point on ability-match is the gist of the question with regard to school selection. We are seeking safety colleges to which S would be happy to attend. We have the state flagship as a safety, but we need to research private safeties, preferrably that offer a ton of merit money. I read an article last year (can't remember where) that discussed the honors colleges within lesser known (and lower ranked) colleges. Several top students were interviewed who had turned down top schools for money and the honors programs at these schools and were very happy. This is encouraging regarding ability-match issues. If anyone has seen that article and can link it I would appreciate the assistance.</p>

8

<p>One thing to keep in mind is that people often confuse 'reach' with 'more desirable.' It is possible that your child's 'safety' school is also the best fit and the one he or she most wants to attend. Our S's situation is a case in point: The school he was most keen to attend and was the best fit from our perspective, also happened to be the one he was most likely to be admitted to. If that occurs, consider yourself fortunate-the lack of stress in S's Sr. year is a gift we will cherish.</p>

9

<p>I agree with BethieVt definition of safety/match/reach, and it is exactly the parameters we used for my daughter's college list. I think any school with an acceptance rate below 35-40 % should be considered a reach -- the ONLY exception is if your kid is highly recruited for athletics or has some other unique quality. This is a conservative viewpoint, but if you read the posts of kids who didn't get in anywhere this year, I think it makes a lot of sense to be conservative these days.</p>

<p>Don't assume that because your son's stats are above the 75th, or even the 90th, percentile at a college that he won't be intellectually challenged. Many schools have honors colleges, for example, where the brightest kids get special classes/profs/etc. Some public universities, like UMich and UWisconsin, are excellent schools that will meet the needs of the brightest kids. Many kids with high stats get great merit awards at schools with lower stat averages, so your son would find peers there too. Also, in this highly competitive admissions game, more and more high-stat kids are going to a wide variety of schools simply because they can't get into the Ivies and other highly selective schools.</p>

10

<p>^^I absolutely agree, and he will be applying to our state flagship as one safety. His stats are not so high and his ec's not so outstanding that he would likely be accepted to its honors college, which now has an <em>average</em> admitted SAT score of 1450, up from 1350 five years ago. It will not be the end of the world for him or any of us if he attends there. He would prefer a LAC though, and the smaller environment would be a much better fit for him. Thanks for the advice about below 35-40% admit as reaches. I certainly was looking at this rate as a match. This is what I wanted to clarify. Big mistake, I take it.</p>

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<p>My sense is that with upper tier schools, no matter how high the scores, the schools need to be thought of as in the high reach category. Our oldest child entered college several years ago when things weren't quite as outrageously difficult as they are now. Her scores were over the top 75% of every school to which she applied, including a number of schools that did not accept her. (She was top heavy with high reaches.) I think that when you get into the upper stratosphere of schools, there is not only an issue of randomness as to which applicant with stellar numbers will be accepted, but an issue of which school is intrigued by the particular EC's and area of interest. So that some schools in the equivalent range will not particularly care about the fact that a student has been doing research on the implications of pollution on pollywogs in the SW Sludgy RIver, or that another makes and plays medieval wind instruments at prestigious music festivals, whereas a different school in the same tier will accept the student with a note saying how much they long to hear the student playing his whatchamacallit or a phone call from a zoolology professor. As things become increasingly competitive, this seems to be more the case with match schools as well, given that with increasing numbers of excellent applicants, the schools have the luxury of being more selective within the applicant population.</p>

<p>We were fortunate enough to have an excellent GC, so when we made a list, we were able to ask if there were schools on the list to which our oldest would absolutely be accepted unless she robbed a liquor store. We had three of these. One of these was a state school that accepts students pretty much by the numbers and we were able to calculate that D would be accepted as a certainty. A school like this is definitely a safety. With the other two, we visited, and D arranged to talk with people in admissions, and sincerely showed major interest. Although she is happily attending one of her high reaches, she still talks about one of these safeties, attended by some of her friends, where she thinks -- and we agree -- she could have been very happy as well.</p>

<p>We tended to think of match schools and reach (as opposed to high reach) schools as being essentially in the same category in terms of liklihood of admission. A couple of these schools had had notoriously quirky admissions decisions at her high school in past years, with complete shock that they had accepted student A and not student B, and we kept in mind that even if they turned down a lowish percentage of students with D's numbers, she could still be that person. </p>

<p>When we attended an admitted students' event at a top 50 college for a younger child this year, after the school told us about the average SAT's and GPA for this year's class, they pointed out that they had rejected more than 1600 applicants with higher numbers. We know students for whom this school would have been a safety in past years who didn't get in. You really do need to be conservative about safeties and lowish matches.</p>

<p>My point is that for us, it made sense to lump schools into the will almost certainly get in no matter what category; the really hard to get into but you have a shot category; and the almost impossible for anyone to get into so don't hold your breath or fall in love category. Even with Naviance, this isn't an exact science. Look on the CC boards for each school for the past year or two and see the numbers and other attributes for kids who are and are not accepted. Take a look at the Fiske guide and the numbers the colleges release on their websites or to their student newspapers online. And bear in mind that if the school only accepts 10 or 20 percent of its applicants, no matter how great your kid's numbers look relative to the school's number, it cannot be thought of as a match or in any way taken for granted as a sure thing.</p>

<p>All this said, read the saga of Andison from a few years ago, and given the enormous number of students applying this coming year, hedge your bets with a couple more applications than might have seemed sensible in the past, and with at least a few spectacular safeties.</p>

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<p>A safety school is one where your child is certainly to be accepted or is accepted. Many of us take care of the safety by getting a early action or rolling decision done early. A state school or local private school may accept your child on the spot or with weeks. Once you have that acceptance in hand, and if this is a school that your child knows, understands and would attend, you can go on from there. In our case with our oldest son, we had a defer from GTown, an accept from BC, State U and a less selective catholic school by December 10th or so. That way, we knew where he stood. Since the only reason to continue with the apps was for colleges more desirable than what he already had, it cut the list considerably. With my son this year, the same occurred. With the middle son, he did not get into the programs desired in his early choice of schools, and we had to scurry and regroup since it was clear that the selectivity was higher than he could comfortably have for a safety. In his case, we had to come up with alternative courses, since it was the program of study that was keeping him out rather than the selectivity of the schools itself. So he applied to schools that were not as selective but with strong performing arts programs that were not audition bases as safeties, since we knew he could get into such schools academically from the early acceptances from more selective schools that had an audition policy for the program. </p>

<p>Many times the safety school is a local school that you know already, or your state school. Until you have that acceptance in hand, it is not a good idea these days to assume some schools where your child's stats may be way up there, are safeties, as interest in the school can play a large role. I know some kids who had some surprise rejections because of their attitudes towards their safeties. They did not like them, and it showed. </p>

<p>We were ever so grateful in our case this year, that our son really like his early choices, and his safeties, as well as his reaches. In fact, better than his top reach school which he turned down for an early action school that he just really liked and was able to parlay the situation into a nice merit award. </p>

<p>I really think of safeties as sure things. Not schools where the stats indicate your kids would be tops. I really prefer to have it in the bag before I even call it a safety having seen some nasty surprises.</p>

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<p>I agree that a safety that has EA or rolling decision is a good route to take especially for a high stat kid. If your kid is science/engineering oriented there are a lot of good choices of schools that have a pretty good acceptance rate and also have fairly high stats. Big state schools with honors programs is another route to take for safeties. For our son, he applied to six reaches for everybody, one reachy-match (still only a 18% acceptance rate), and two safeties, one of which let us know he was in by November. He ended up getting into the most selective of the reaches (probably due partly to his academic interests and partly to being a legacy), his reachy-match and his two safeties.</p>

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<p>
[quote]
we were able to ask if there were schools on the list to which our oldest would absolutely be accepted unless she robbed a liquor store

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Now that's a definition of a safety school! Thanks, CCSurfer!</p>

15

<p>The way some of these colleges promote their cultures of drunkenness, they probably give extra points in admissions for students who rob liquor stores.</p>

<p>To answer the OP's question, you really have to make more of a qualitative assessment of your son's application.</p>

<p>For example, most elite colleges get huge numbers of high SAT applications from white students in affluent northeast suburbs. So, if your son falls into a category like that with a glut of applicants, then you would need him to be at the 75th percentile for a college to be considered a "match".</p>

<p>On the flip side, an underrepresented minority from a low income family might well be a pretty solid bet at the same school with 50th percentile SATs. </p>

<p>It's not a "one-size-fits-all" formula. I recommend a book called "The Gatekeepers" that tracks a year in admissions at Wesleyan University to get a handle on the qualitative nature of admissions. After reading the book, you should be able to make a far more informed estimate of where your son's chances lie.</p>

<p>You also have to consider each individual school. For example, 30% of Williams freshmen are recruited athletes who are tagged as "likely 4 year varsity players" on national championship caliber teams. So, if you are looking to get brownie points for high school sports, you better be pretty darn good. Or, your app better offer something completely different (like a science research geek).</p>

<p>Or, learn that Swarthmore places considerable emphasis on the "Why Swarthmore?" essay. They are looking for students who have done their research and can articulate why that college would be a specific good fit beyond "pretty campus, great location, strong academics". It's rare for a student to get accepted without communicating an understanding of the campus culture and a good fit.</p>

<p>Your job (and your son's job) is to identify what makes each school tick and evaluating his chances accordingly.</p>

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<p>A few other points from our recent experience - help your S try to find safety or match schools he will really want to attend in case the "must go there but it's a real reach" falls through. He should apply to schools with rolling admissions VERY EARLY - friend of ours did that and also got an excellent finaid package. If you are considering ED, your S should line up his teacher recommendations NOW - S's were already really busy by mid September and he was back in the queue. We noticed that some schools have a 2-round ED cycle; I think they use the 2nd ED cycle to attract students deferred or rejected by their original ED.</p>

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<p>I agree with interestedad's assessment. The published SATs are too wide to use as a guide and you need to guess where your son would fall. Look at geographic diversity, race and gender (a lot of LAC get more applicants from girls than boys). Another thing I found is to look at the SAT ranges for each section. If your student has one very low section, high scores in the other sections may not make up for it.</p>

<p>Oh, and I really recommend trying to find at least 2 safeties where your son would really want to attend. One of my kids only got accepted to safeties and that's not that unusual.</p>

18

<p>Just wanted to reinforce what M's Mom (and others) have been saying about the rolling admission safety school. Luckily for my family, my D fell in love with her safety, applied in September, and was admitted with significant merit money by mid-October. Even though she was admitted to more matchy schools (but none of her reaches), she is headed for that safety school in September.</p>

<p>Her senior year has been stress-free and golden. My advice - spend just as much time researching solid safety schools (that you think your child will GLADLY attend,) as you do those reaches, and apply everywhere early. </p>

<p>Hey, others here have expressed the same sentiment with more eloquence, but it never hurts to be reminded!</p>

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<p>The way college admissions have changed in the past 3 or 4 years means that HS students are aiming at a moving target. i.e., last year's match may be a reach next year. For that reason I think students should be thinking </p>

<p>uber safety, safety, match, reach</p>

<p>rather than </p>

<p>safety, match, reach, high reach</p>

20

<p>I totally agree that there is not a one size fits all method of determining the answer to your question. That said, and keeping in mind that many schools use very holistic criteria (and many factors such as athletic ability, legacy status, URM status, geographical and international diversity, special talents etc.) to determine acceptances, first off get access to the most up to date numbers. Even the most current issues of books such as Fiske Guide or websites like collegeboard.com have a lag period of at least two years. So check out the websites of the colleges themselves, where stats for an incoming class are generally made available by the fall of that year. Don't confuse articles (generally posted in the spring) that talk about stats of <em>accepted</em> students. Accepted versus enrolled statistics are two very different things and you will get a much better idea of where you fall in terms of chances from the latter. </p>

<p>Once you know the SAT ranges (it's the mid 50% range that is more useful for comparative purposes) also check out the percentage of freshmen in the top 10 or 25 percent of the class. A caveat here is that schools that do not rank are not included in these statistics. A very top public or private HS can sometimes yield results that defy or greatly modlfy the rankings info - this is why it's so great to have access to scattergram or scattergram type info. If your school doesn't offer it, you can try to do a search here on CC for similar schools to your own. There are many past threads here that include guest passwords for high schools around the country. Just use the information with a grain of salt - there's so much you don't know about the reasons for an acceptance or rejection that goes well beyond stats and grades.</p>

<p>Of all the resources, I found the book Admission Matters by Sally Springer and Marion Franck to give the most practical answer to your Q (and many others). I highly recommend the book. Their formula based guide is not meant to be set in stone of course and a lot will have to do with all the other factors (track record of the HS, for example) that people have mentioned here - but IMO it's still pretty useful as a starting place: </p>

<p>A Good Bet(or safety) college: If your scores are above the 75% for incoming freshmen and your GPA or class rank is at the high end of the freshman class for the last year AND the acceptance rate of the school is over 50%, that school <em>might</em> be a good bet for you. The higher the acceptance rate the safer the bet and the lower your SAT/GPA can be compared to the mid range SATs . </p>

<p>A possible college: Stats/GPA/rank puts you in the middle AND acceptance rate higher than 50% OR Scores are much higher than the midrange but acceptance rates around 35%. Again, the higher your scores compared to freshman class the lower the acceptance rate can be. Realize that for the competitive schools the midrange of scores includes students who are accepted with hooks of one kind or another so it's more or less true that a relatively unhooked kid is often going to need to be at that 75% or higher to be competitive. The schools will rarely tell you that in their info sessions, though. </p>

<p>Long shots (aka reach): Any school with an acceptance rate of 20% or less has to be considered a long shot for anyone. Admissions results are especially unpredicable here. Schools that admit between 20-35% are long shots for most - <em>could</em> be a match for a student with stats and GPA over the 75% of the school.</p>