<p>Victory,
Your calculations assume 100 per cent yield. For 550 spots they are probably accepting 800+ students. Still a low acceptance rate, but higher than 1.9%</p>
<p>Also Victory, many of those hooked applicants are in the ED round - especially the recruited athletes.</p>
<p>My son’s school did well this year, with the highly selective schools and first choices, I was told. A few years ago, the results were not so good. So it can vary. </p>
<p>I can tell you, that it’s my impression that there are more students applying to the more selective schools these days, and to the more pragmatic programs. That makes those much more competitive. On the other hand, with the smaller college aged population, those schools that are not in such categories are finding it tougher to fill their classes and many are discount more and to more students. The market is not all that efficient in this area, and it takes time for these things to catch up. </p>
<p>That more students are applying to more colleges makes this even more difficult for student and colleges alike as there are more factors at play. Things are changing drastically in this field.</p>
<p>From what I have seen, some record low acceptance rates at the most selective schools this year, despite a smaller high school graduating group.</p>
<p>Victory</p>
<p>You are right! Duke is now the Stanford of the South! Its almost as difficult to get in as the big 3 ivies! Probably on par with the lower ivies!</p>
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<p>Not always easier admissions criteria, those hooks can be used as the tipping point between two otherwise equal candidates.</p>
<p>@parentofpeople Wrong. It is a huge advantage…the studies have shown this.</p>
<p>I can testify to the huge admissions drop. </p>
<p>Last year, 10 kids alone were accepted to Cornell from my school. This year, including athletic recruits, we totaled 8 <em>to all ivies</em>. Everyone is walking around asking what the hell happened. We did have about 6 Georgetown admits, a Duke admit, and an MIT admit. However, this doesn’t even remotely approach prior years’ numbers for us. I, personally, in the top 5% of my class w/ a 2190, and a 33 was admitted to just one Top 25 School (UVA) despite applying to several. Considering the general theme though, I consider myself lucky. It is weird and will only seem to get weirder. The juniors from my school are actually starting to panic. </p>
<p>I’ll be curious to see what will happen next year.</p>
<p>@ Fig Leaves -UofC had a 13% admit rate in 2012. WashU’s was 17%, Northwestern, 15%. Please tell me how anyone considers these “safeties?” And “match” does not mean that you will get in. It means that your stats are in line with those whom they accept. The still have holistic admissions and can’t accept every student whose stats meet their criteria.</p>
<pre><code>I do think more kids are applying to the top colleges, but it seems that many think it’s a lot easier than it really is. Any school with an admit rate under 25% is not a shoe-in for anyone. A lot of kids apparently are receiving some very lousy college counseling.
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<p>Enrollment management trends: <a href=“http://blog.noellevitz.com/category/enrollment-management/”>http://blog.noellevitz.com/category/enrollment-management/</a></p>
<p>There still seems to be the belief that the Ivies/top tier schools are the key to success. Many recent surveys have shown that this is way down on the list of what employers look for. The best thing about these top schools may be the network. </p>
<p>My daughter had no desire to go to an Ivy- and realistically probably would not have gotten in- and instead looked at what was right for her. Rankings played into it but it was more about having a well-rounded college experience and a variety of schools to apply to. She applied to 11 schools (2 safeties, 2 reach, 7 “matches”) although 2 of them were out of state public universities that have guaranteed admission for a certain percent of the residents. She ended up getting into 6 schools- 5 of which are in the top 50 in the country and a couple are internationally ranked- was waitlisted at 2 and rejected from 3. All of the outcomes, except for one, were exactly as we had hoped/expected. Rejected by her reaches and one of the 2 public universities. One “match” waitlisted her but they also are notorious for a very high acceptance rate for ED applicants. She did not go that route. </p>
<p>I think we have to be careful not selling the dream of the Ivies/top schools as the worth of the student. I also think students need to be encouraged to look beyond the numbers. Time and again, test scores have not correlated with college success and the test optional schools have demonstrated that the capability of the student is more based on the day to day academics than sitting for a test. Once you get into any school, no one will ask about the SAT scores, just like after a couple of years of working, no employer really cares about your GPA. </p>
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<p>Sure, recruited athletes or URM but not every hook will get a weaker applicant over a stronger one. Not all hooks are the same. That is what NOT ALWAYS means.</p>
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<p>I think this is down to your selective perception of CC, frankly. It’s never been the case that “25-50% of CC members were accepted to Ivies or similarly prestigious schools,” and if you go to these schools’ subforums, you’ll find plenty of accepted students in the RD decision threads for this year.</p>
<p>Also, Victory’s Duke math is absolutely laughable.</p>
<p>@moonchild For MY school Chicago had a had a 28% admit rate, WashU’s 50%, Northwestern 46% for the last 5 years.</p>
<p>Yeah. Victory forgot most of the students with hook applied and admitted ED, not RD. And also, the yield rate is calculated from the total number of admitted students not just those without hooks or from RD. So for 1700 seats with an assumed a yield rate of 55% (from class 2017), they will admit over 3000. After the 800 from ED, they will admit >2200 in RD. Indeed, they admitted over 4000 students in 2012 with an yield rate of 42% and admitted around 3600 last year (2897 at RD).
Anyway, the acceptance rate is going lower this year for sure as the pool of applicants increased at most top schools by 10-20% this year. It is not due to an increase in high school graduate as it actually is on a slow downward trend. It is the average number of application per student increased. It seems the economy is getting better that the parents are willing to spend a few hundred dollars and let the student apply a few more prestigious schools hoping to increase the chance. I expect the yield rates will drop a little bit this year as a result of that.</p>