Hello, I am a homeschooled student and am able to apply for either spring or fall 2021. Are spring admissions usually more or less selective than fall?
Anyone?
Many colleges only allow students to apply for the fall semester (but a few those will admit a few applicants to start in the spring at their choice, not the applicant’s choice, often offering a special program like study abroad for the fall).
Colleges that accept applications for the spring semester are typically less selective ones. However, spring semester may be more or less selective, depending on the application volume relative to space available.
Of course, open admission colleges admit students starting any semester.
@ucbalumnus Schools such as Ohio State, Boston University, Fordham and many more offer spring admissions. I wouldn’t consider these “less selective schools” as they are still in the top 100 out of thousands in terms of selectivity. Is there a way I can see the data of fall vs spring acceptance rates and average stats for specific schools?
Also, unrelated question. Where can I see the 25/75 percentile stats stats for rejected students rather than accepted students?
I don’t know about OSU but as @ucbalumnus said, for BU (and a few more besides), you don’t apply for spring. You apply for fall, and if they like you but don’t have enough space in their class for fall they will offer you a spring admit. I’m not familiar with all of them, but for at least some you will do summer semester right after your first spring one to be able to graduate with the fall entering class. Because many of theses colleges make offers to their fall and spring admits at the same time, they don’t have different stats, at least publicly.
For Fordham it seems you can apply directly to spring, I did not know this despite the fact that Fordham was on my daughter’s shortlist in the last application cycle - it might be a new thing? I doubt these programs would be less competitive than fall, if anything a direct spring admit might be used to fill gaps in fall enrollment and make it harder to find a spot if you don’t have the profile they’re looking for.
USC is the only college I recall seeing that publishes the 25/75 of all applicants as well as admits (no one publishes data on denied students afaik).
Tl;dr I’m not sure the data you want is available in the form you want.
Is there any particular reason that you would want to start in spring? Your options might also be limited in terms of programs you can do because of course sequencing.