<p>Nice rebound from last year's slump:
A</a> bumper year for applications to top colleges | Philadelphia Inquirer | 01/31/2010</p>
<p>Thanks JW.</p>
<p>The spike in applications from California kind of discredits the media theory a year ago that private colleges would be wiped out by students flocking to public universities. I guess the pundits forgot that public universities might not be immune to the impact of a shrinking economy, too.</p>
<p>Thanks for sharing - very interesting, though perhaps slightly depressing for me 
</p>
<p>Personally, the state of public schools here didn’t cause me to apply to more private schools/apply to less schools - I still applied to as many state schools as I would have otherwise, and I didn’t really apply to more private schools than I would have otherwise; however, what did change is that UCs are really, really far down on my list. I applied EDII to Swarthmore, but if I don’t get in, I certainly will consider the private schools to which I am accepted more seriously than the UCs to which I am accepted.</p>
<p>A shocking number of students at my school applied to no state schools at all, however - so case in point, I suppose!</p>
<p>Penn has more than 26000 applications for 2400 spots. This means their selectivity will be lower than 10%. Wow!! This is like Yale or one of the others! There is bound to be a massacre come April, if not already.</p>
<p>I wonder what the selectivity is for Swarthmore. I get the feeling, my son would not have got in if he applied now.</p>
<p>boy, i thought this year was supposed to be easier! If the increase in apps is coming not just from Californians, but from students applying to more colleges at once, it seems that there might be more opportunities for waitlisted students.</p>
<p>achat, Penn (and any other school) has to accept significantly significantly more people than there are spots in order to account for yield.</p>
<p>One more thing to worry about lol.</p>
<p>Keilexandra, yes, you are right. I completely forgot! Yes, they do admit significantly more people in order to account for yield. I’ve not been in touch with this college admissions stuff, personally, for years now. Just visit this forum from time to time.</p>
<p>It’s been a while since I’ve posted, daughter graduated last year. Re: students flocking to publics and leaving privates high and dry. That depends on the “level” of the private college. Swarthmore and peers will have nothing to worry about from this behavior. </p>
<p>However, 2nd tier and certainly 3rd tier privates may face problems. </p>
<p>That being said publics aren’t the relative bargain they once were in many locations. It’s not that the cost of delivering a college education has increased so much as it is cost shifting from state general fund revenues to “local” sources (read: tuition and fees). As the proportion of the state budget that goes to a given system declines, the costs imposed to other sources of revenue must increase. </p>
<p>I note from the Chronicle of Higher Education that Williams has ended its “no loans” aid policy as a result of endowment issues. </p>
<p>The decline in value of endowments has hit many public universities as well.</p>
<p>Everyone (corporations - schools - are “people” now according to SCOTUS 
) is experiencing difficulty.</p>
<p>Applicants need to be very thorough in researching what the total four year cost of a given school is going to be.</p>