Schools with an atmosphere similar to Stanford

[xiggi]

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For the very best applicants, yes, I think increasingly it is mostly a reach/safety dichotomy. Finding matches - colleges with similar stats and decently high admit rates, like Chicago of a few years back - is almost impossible these days. A school like Dartmouth admits about 8% of applicants in the RD round…not terribly good odds even if you do fit in the target/BWRK crowd (2250+, 4.00, good ecs, etc.).

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<p>Warbler, I don’t think I was talking about Chicago and Dartmouth, or schools with admission rates well-below 20 percent. I thought I was pretty clear that I was talking about Michigan. Feel free to add schools such as UT-Austin or Wisconsin in the mix.</p>

<p>As far as the terms used in admissions, many like to play games of semantics. I like to keep it simple, as it really makes little difference in the end. Only the admission matters!</p>

<p>As far as twists and turns, please consider that a competitive applicant in Texas could consider UT-Austin his or her safety, but would have to consider Michigan a reach? Are the schools THAT different?</p>