From the TAMU Office of Admissions website:
*Beginning with applicants for Fall 2021, academic admission will no longer be available.
I’m curious of your thoughts about how TAMU admissions will handle all the applications with a holistic review process next year (ie, those that would have been academic admits based on test scores and top 25%). The first batch of admits came out on Friday for this year’s group. Will next year’s kids start getting acceptances this early or will it delay everything till January-February like most holistic reviews have been? Perhaps just top 10% will find out around mid September and everyone else in January or later? Or will acceptances just trickle in like rolling admissions at some colleges?
I’m also curious if, for this first year of the new cycle (Class of 2025) they will camp out on some sort of invisible line for test scores that won’t really be publicized? Like, ACT scores of 32 or better in this pile of pushing these applications through a little faster to acceptance (provided all other pieces of their holistic review look good).
Just pondering these ideas since I’ve got a whole year to read about the Class of 2024 and their sagas of waiting for the magical 6 tabs before my son’s waiting game begins.
As far as Acceptance decisions, I don’t think the timing will change much. Auto Admit (and Academic Admits right now) usually hear back in Sept-Oct, and then holistic reviews after that. Next year I anticipate that the first round of acceptances for Auto Admits will still be Sept, just without the Academic Admits who will then change to Holistic reviews.
@bargainshopper75 , thanks for the link. I do remember reading through that back when it came out now that I see it again. A lot of debate went into for or against the change it seems. I’m just curious what it means now for timelines of finding out! Last year, one of my daughter’s college picks didn’t notify until April 1. She had already decided on TAMU by then so it was kinda like, well, gee, thanks, glad she got in but you’re too late to the party…
@TXRunningMom I am curious too since my second son also wants to attend and would be class of 2025. Unlike his brother (freshman engineering now), he probably won’t be top 10%. I haven’t read the 2024 boards too closely, but I did notice that this year, the applicants have to fill in a standard form giving all the classes they have taken and will take, and grades. I wonder, if by having all this info in a standard form, will A&M use the info in these forms to, say, compare the student’s difficulty of classes taken. I know this info was in the application in the past, but maybe this form allows Tamu to use the info in a different way. With all the applications they receive, I would just think that they have algorithms to help them “rank” the students using all concrete data available. Just thinking out loud…
Yes, I also think test scores are still going to be really important. Maybe one of the reasons for getting rid of the academic admit, is so that students with great test scores, but not in the top 25% due to a very competitive school, will have a better chance of being admitted.
Definitely not looking forward to the holistic review a year from now!
I think holistic is hyperbolic. Academics are going to be the first pass to get into the pile to be reviewed. (along with the top whatever % will be used in the constant shift of that metric). As above, this gives give more room for flexibility on rank and gets great students that miss that mark for whatever reason.
I don’t think it will make that much difference in application process.
In 2018 academic admits accounted for 19.58%, compared to 47.02% that were automatic (Top 10%) of students admitted. If you look at total number of applicants academic admission accounted for 12.98% of all applicants.
And I think candidates with strong scores are going to be at the top of the holistic process anyway.
Considering many neighboring states offer Texas students with decent ACT/SAT scores the equivalent of in state tuition, because Texas has more high quality students than it has spaces for at TAMU and UT, I think there is a good chance that the elimination of the academic admit could result in less OOS admissions. My reasoning for this - say you have two students with the same test scores that in the past would have been academic admits. One from OOS is ranked 23% and comes from a HS that would not be considered high performing and has a couple AP classes - GPA is 3.4UW. Then you have someone from Texas, at a HS with 14 NMF. Ranked 28% with 9AP classes and 3.7UW GPA.
One thing I think we will eventually see TAMU going toward is admission based on major. The soft and hard skills needed for an engineer/artist/teacher/nurse/journalist are different. While there can be universal academic standards, other factors need to play into the admission decisions based on the field of study.
