Total Applications Growth/Decline, class of 2017

Applying to College
141

<p>Cltdad-</p>

<p>You bring up a good point in that some of the schools mentioned here eliminated their EA/ED programs during the time period we are looking at (and then reinstated them). That should be considered in the discussion.</p>

<p>But it terms of the US News data, the 2008 book uses data from Dec 2006 – which I believe was just before Harvard and Princeton eliminated their programs. So, in this case, the US News data is older than it appears so we need take that into account when correlating it to other data.</p>

142

<p>A correction.
The 2008 US News data are actually for the class that entered in the fall of 2006 (i.e. the graduating class of 2010), which would make it Dec 2005 EA data. Harvard did have EA that year. I would still be wary of US News data, but it seems to check out with this source.</p>

<p>Throughout the past three years, applications have remained stable - 3,882 to 4,212 to 3,872 this year. The numbers admitted have ranged from 902 to 892, to slightly more than 800 this year. </p>

<p>[Harvard</a> Gazette: Early Admission numbers return to past levels](<a href=“http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2005/12.15/01-early.html]Harvard”>http://www.news.harvard.edu/gazette/2005/12.15/01-early.html)</p>

143

<p>Mastadon- here is some historic Harvard info that may give your analysis some perspective!
[Applications</a> still rise despite McCarthy slur](<a href=“http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1954/2/23/applications-still-rise-despite-mccarthy-slur/]Applications”>Applications Still Rise Despite McCarthy Slur | News | The Harvard Crimson)
['59</a> Applications to Reach Record High, Possibly 4000 | The Harvard Crimson](<a href=“http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1954/10/6/59-applications-to-reach-record-high/]'59”>'59 Applications to Reach Record High, Possibly 4000 | News | The Harvard Crimson)</p>

<p>A different dynamic back then…

</p>

<p>This one is interesting on Harvard’s debate on growing
[url=<a href=“http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2005/6/6/overcrowded-when-members-of-the-class/]Overcrowded[/url”>Overcrowded | News | The Harvard Crimson]Overcrowded[/url</a>]</p>

144

<p>Harvard apps have indeed flattened out before…
[NO</a> INCREASE SHOWN IN APPLICANTS FOR 1937 | The Harvard Crimson](<a href=“http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1933/5/24/no-increase-shown-in-applicants-for/]NO”>NO INCREASE SHOWN IN APPLICANTS FOR 1937 | News | The Harvard Crimson)</p>

<p>And back in 1942…
[2100</a> Men Apply for Admission to College | The Harvard Crimson](<a href=“http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1942/5/1/2100-men-apply-for-admission-to/]2100”>2100 Men Apply for Admission to College | News | The Harvard Crimson)</p>

<p>This is great stuff on thecrimson.com. Much more in the way of articles talking about applications to their “houses” than applications to the university.</p>

145

<p>

</p>

<p>I am not sure why there is a still a discussion about the correct number. In my first corrective post, I shared the numbers for the class of 2010.</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>And, fwiw, my subsequent post that finished with the link to Stanford’s CDS for that year had the CORRECT numbers for admits. The total of 853 SCEA and 1591 RD admits accounts for the 2,444 who were admitted. The number of enrolled students was also correctly quoted. </p>

<p>All this said, I am not sure if a discussion of the meaning of a high or low EA/ED impact on the admission can be framed in terms of … selectivity, especially without defining what selectivity means in that discussion. While the term is often used, its meanining is hardly universal, or at least its interpretation by the readers. USNews defines selectivity in the form of an index while others define as a proxy for the quality of the school or its students. </p>

<p>And, a last fwiw, although yield “could be” an indirect component to the “final” selectivity of a school, it is mostly a popularity index, and one that means very different things at highly selective schools that at the middle of the pack schools. Yield can indicate a very clear choice by a highly competitive student or a choice from an average student to attend his or her best choice even if a non-selective school. For instance, a comparison of the yields at Pomona and BYU and Nebraska shows that comparing yields at various is nothing more than a …
FOOL’S ERRAND. </p>

<p>In so many words, yield rarely offers an interesting subject for discussions, except for enrollment managers or cheerleading alums! ;)</p>

146

<p>I think yield can be interesting, but only if one is comparing peer schools. Comparing Amherst’s yield to Williams’ tells you a little something about the head to head popularity of the two schools, but trying to compare either to BYU or Nebraska will give you no useful information. Of course it still doesn’t tell you anything about the quality of education at either institution.</p>

147

<p>news has definitely slowed…</p>

<p>Barnard revision upward from NYT report: +3.3% (5,609)
[Applications</a> to Barnard rise 3 percent](<a href=“http://www.columbiaspectator.com/2013/02/04/applications-barnard-rise-3]Applications”>http://www.columbiaspectator.com/2013/02/04/applications-barnard-rise-3)</p>

<p>re-sort
Skidmore +42% (8,126)
Northern Kentucky >+30% (no app count)
Clark +27.8% (5,472)
Case Western +25% (>18,000)
UChicago +20% (30,369)
Boston U +19.4% (52,532)
UCSC +16.9% (38,507)
UC Merced +16.6% (14,966)
U Washington +15.7% (30,073)
St Lawrence +14.4% (3,080)
Brandeis +14.2% (9,370)
UCSB +13.9% (62,402)
UC Riverside +13.2% (33,809)
UC Davis +13.1% (55,877)
Tufts +12% (18,339)
UC Irvine +11.3% (60,619)
Alma +11.1% (1,820)
NYU +11.2% (48,606)
UCLA +10.8% (80,472)
UCSD +10.8% (67,403)
Babson +10.3% (6,080)
Pepperdine +10% (10,443)
UC Berkeley +9.7% (67,658)
Emerson +9.7% (7,756)
Claremont McKenna ~+9% (5,461 by NYT, back-calc’d to be ~5510 from CMC)
Vanderbilt +8.9% (30,870)
Lehigh +8.7% (12,548)
Rochester +8.2% (17,146)
San Diego State +8.0 (74,458)
Colgate +6.9% (8,335)
St Andrews +6% (14,355)
Stanford +5.9% (38,800)
Bates +5.9% (5,194)
Trinity +5.7% (7,500)
Columbia +5.1% (33,460)
Fordham +5.0% (35,229)
Bowdoin +4.7% (7,029)
Wesleyan +4.2% (10,942)
U North Carolina +4.0% (30,689)
U Southern Cal +3.7% (47,800)
Virginia +3.5% (~29,250)
Barnard +3.3% (5,609)
Colby +2.8% (5,390)
Yale +2.8% (29,790)
Middlebury +2.6% (9,075)
William & Mary +2.5% (14,000)
Union +2.5% (5,643)
Olin +2.4% (800)
Northwestern +2.2% (32,766)
Rice +1.4% (15,345)
Juliard +0.82% (2,338)
JHU +0.52% (20,608)
Duke +0.4% (31,752)
Brown +0.22% (28,733)
Villanova +0.21% (14,933)
Penn +0.00% (31,219)
Caltech -0.02% (5,536)
Scripps -0.29% (2,366)
Grinnell -0.57% (4,528)
Princeton -0.59% (26,505)
Georgetown <0%, >-1% (apps unknown)
Holy Cross -1.3% (7,079)
Hamilton -1.8% (5,017)
Elon -2.5% (9,791)
Dartmouth -2.8% (22,400)
Williams -3.3% (6,836)
Bucknell -3.6% (7,834)
Vassar -3.9% (7,600)
Amherst -8.2% (7863)
RPI -10.7% (13,600)
Boston College -26% (~25,000)</p>

148

<p>Georgetown announces their numbers…-0.12% (20,025)
[Regular</a> Decision Applications Plateau - The Hoya](<a href=“http://www.thehoya.com/regular-decision-applications-plateau-1.2982872]Regular”>http://www.thehoya.com/regular-decision-applications-plateau-1.2982872)</p>

<p>NC State +5.5% (calc’d to be >21,384, count incomplete)
[NC</a> State, UNC see rise in freshman applications](<a href=“http://www.wncn.com/story/20939267/nc-state-unc-see-rise-in-freshman-applications]NC”>http://www.wncn.com/story/20939267/nc-state-unc-see-rise-in-freshman-applications)</p>

<p>re-sort
Skidmore +42% (8,126)
Northern Kentucky >+30% (no app count)
Clark +27.8% (5,472)
Case Western +25% (>18,000)
UChicago +20% (30,369)
Boston U +19.4% (52,532)
UCSC +16.9% (38,507)
UC Merced +16.6% (14,966)
U Washington +15.7% (30,073)
St Lawrence +14.4% (3,080)
Brandeis +14.2% (9,370)
UCSB +13.9% (62,402)
UC Riverside +13.2% (33,809)
UC Davis +13.1% (55,877)
Tufts +12% (18,339)
UC Irvine +11.3% (60,619)
Alma +11.1% (1,820)
NYU +11.2% (48,606)
UCLA +10.8% (80,472)
UCSD +10.8% (67,403)
Babson +10.3% (6,080)
Pepperdine +10% (10,443)
UC Berkeley +9.7% (67,658)
Emerson +9.7% (7,756)
Claremont McKenna ~+9% (5,461 by NYT, back-calc’d to be ~5510 from CMC)
Vanderbilt +8.9% (30,870)
Lehigh +8.7% (12,548)
Rochester +8.2% (17,146)
San Diego State +8.0 (74,458)
Colgate +6.9% (8,335)
St Andrews +6% (14,355)
Stanford +5.9% (38,800)
Bates +5.9% (5,194)
Trinity +5.7% (7,500)
NC State +5.5% (calc’d to be >21,384, count incomplete)
Columbia +5.1% (33,460)
Fordham +5.0% (35,229)
Bowdoin +4.7% (7,029)
Wesleyan +4.2% (10,942)
U North Carolina +4.0% (30,689)
U Southern Cal +3.7% (47,800)
Virginia +3.5% (~29,250)
Barnard +3.3% (5,609)
Colby +2.8% (5,390)
Yale +2.8% (29,790)
Middlebury +2.6% (9,075)
William & Mary +2.5% (14,000)
Union +2.5% (5,643)
Olin +2.4% (800)
Northwestern +2.2% (32,766)
Rice +1.4% (15,345)
Juliard +0.82% (2,338)
JHU +0.52% (20,608)
Duke +0.4% (31,752)
Brown +0.22% (28,733)
Villanova +0.21% (14,933)
Penn +0.00% (31,219)
Caltech -0.02% (5,536)
Georgetown -0.12% (20,025)
Scripps -0.29% (2,366)
Grinnell -0.57% (4,528)
Princeton -0.59% (26,505)
Holy Cross -1.3% (7,079)
Hamilton -1.8% (5,017)
Elon -2.5% (9,791)
Dartmouth -2.8% (22,400)
Williams -3.3% (6,836)
Bucknell -3.6% (7,834)
Vassar -3.9% (7,600)
Amherst -8.2% (7863)
RPI -10.7% (13,600)
Boston College -26% (~25,000)</p>

149

<p>Colgate +7.0% (8,346) eeking out a few more relative to the NYT report
[Colgate</a> University News](<a href=“http://news.colgate.edu/2013/02/applications-to-colgate-increase.html]Colgate”>Applications to Colgate increase | Colgate University)</p>

<p>re-sort
Skidmore +42% (8,126)
Northern Kentucky >+30% (no app count)
Clark +27.8% (5,472)
Case Western +25% (>18,000)
UChicago +20% (30,369)
Boston U +19.4% (52,532)
UCSC +16.9% (38,507)
UC Merced +16.6% (14,966)
U Washington +15.7% (30,073)
St Lawrence +14.4% (3,080)
Brandeis +14.2% (9,370)
UCSB +13.9% (62,402)
UC Riverside +13.2% (33,809)
UC Davis +13.1% (55,877)
Tufts +12% (18,339)
UC Irvine +11.3% (60,619)
Alma +11.1% (1,820)
NYU +11.2% (48,606)
UCLA +10.8% (80,472)
UCSD +10.8% (67,403)
Babson +10.3% (6,080)
Pepperdine +10% (10,443)
UC Berkeley +9.7% (67,658)
Emerson +9.7% (7,756)
Claremont McKenna ~+9% (5,461 by NYT, back-calc’d to be ~5510 from CMC)
Vanderbilt +8.9% (30,870)
Lehigh +8.7% (12,548)
Rochester +8.2% (17,146)
San Diego State +8.0 (74,458)
Colgate +7.0% (8,346)
St Andrews +6% (14,355)
Stanford +5.9% (38,800)
Bates +5.9% (5,194)
Trinity +5.7% (7,500)
NC State +5.5% (calc’d to be >21,384, count incomplete)
Columbia +5.1% (33,460)
Fordham +5.0% (35,229)
Bowdoin +4.7% (7,029)
Wesleyan +4.2% (10,942)
U North Carolina +4.0% (30,689)
U Southern Cal +3.7% (47,800)
Virginia +3.5% (~29,250)
Barnard +3.3% (5,609)
Colby +2.8% (5,390)
Yale +2.8% (29,790)
Middlebury +2.6% (9,075)
William & Mary +2.5% (14,000)
Union +2.5% (5,643)
Olin +2.4% (800)
Northwestern +2.2% (32,766)
Rice +1.4% (15,345)
Juliard +0.82% (2,338)
JHU +0.52% (20,608)
Duke +0.4% (31,752)
Brown +0.22% (28,733)
Villanova +0.21% (14,933)
Penn +0.00% (31,219)
Caltech -0.02% (5,536)
Georgetown -0.12% (20,025)
Scripps -0.29% (2,366)
Grinnell -0.57% (4,528)
Princeton -0.59% (26,505)
Holy Cross -1.3% (7,079)
Hamilton -1.8% (5,017)
Elon -2.5% (9,791)
Dartmouth -2.8% (22,400)
Williams -3.3% (6,836)
Bucknell -3.6% (7,834)
Vassar -3.9% (7,600)
Amherst -8.2% (7863)
RPI -10.7% (13,600)
Boston College -26% (~25,000)</p>

150

<p>Miami U +6.3% (21,593)
Ohio State +25.6% (35,300)
[Colleges</a> see jump in number of applications | The Columbus Dispatch](<a href=“http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2013/02/05/colleges-see-jump-in-number-of-applications.html]Colleges”>http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2013/02/05/colleges-see-jump-in-number-of-applications.html)</p>

<p>Familiar themes

</p>

<p>

</p>

<p>

</p>

151

<p>Note that this also Ohio States’ first year on the common app.</p>

152

<p>thanks for pointing that out barrk123. Seems like most have gotten a pretty huge bump when they adopt the common app.</p>

<p>re-sort
Skidmore +42% (8,126)
Northern Kentucky >+30% (no app count)
Clark +27.8% (5,472)
Ohio State +25.6% (35,300)
Case Western +25% (>18,000)
UChicago +20% (30,369)
Boston U +19.4% (52,532)
UCSC +16.9% (38,507)
UC Merced +16.6% (14,966)
U Washington +15.7% (30,073)
St Lawrence +14.4% (3,080)
Brandeis +14.2% (9,370)
UCSB +13.9% (62,402)
UC Riverside +13.2% (33,809)
UC Davis +13.1% (55,877)
Tufts +12% (18,339)
UC Irvine +11.3% (60,619)
Alma +11.1% (1,820)
NYU +11.2% (48,606)
UCLA +10.8% (80,472)
UCSD +10.8% (67,403)
Babson +10.3% (6,080)
Pepperdine +10% (10,443)
UC Berkeley +9.7% (67,658)
Emerson +9.7% (7,756)
Claremont McKenna ~+9% (5,461 by NYT, back-calc’d to be ~5510 from CMC)
Vanderbilt +8.9% (30,870)
Lehigh +8.7% (12,548)
Rochester +8.2% (17,146)
San Diego State +8.0 (74,458)
Colgate +7.0% (8,346)
Miami U +6.3% (21,593)
St Andrews +6% (14,355)
Stanford +5.9% (38,800)
Bates +5.9% (5,194)
Trinity +5.7% (7,500)
NC State +5.5% (calc’d to be >21,384, count incomplete)
Columbia +5.1% (33,460)
Fordham +5.0% (35,229)
Bowdoin +4.7% (7,029)
Wesleyan +4.2% (10,942)
U North Carolina +4.0% (30,689)
U Southern Cal +3.7% (47,800)
Virginia +3.5% (~29,250)
Barnard +3.3% (5,609)
Colby +2.8% (5,390)
Yale +2.8% (29,790)
Middlebury +2.6% (9,075)
William & Mary +2.5% (14,000)
Union +2.5% (5,643)
Olin +2.4% (800)
Northwestern +2.2% (32,766)
Rice +1.4% (15,345)
Juliard +0.82% (2,338)
JHU +0.52% (20,608)
Duke +0.4% (31,752)
Brown +0.22% (28,733)
Villanova +0.21% (14,933)
Penn +0.00% (31,219)
Caltech -0.02% (5,536)
Georgetown -0.12% (20,025)
Scripps -0.29% (2,366)
Grinnell -0.57% (4,528)
Princeton -0.59% (26,505)
Holy Cross -1.3% (7,079)
Hamilton -1.8% (5,017)
Elon -2.5% (9,791)
Dartmouth -2.8% (22,400)
Williams -3.3% (6,836)
Bucknell -3.6% (7,834)
Vassar -3.9% (7,600)
Amherst -8.2% (7863)
RPI -10.7% (13,600)
Boston College -26% (~25,000)</p>

153

<p>Ziggi-</p>

<p>Please note the tone of the next few posts are based on the following information:</p>

<p>“Xigbar (i.e. Ziggi) is one of the more comical members of the Organization, alongside Axel and Demyx, due to his fondness for wisecracks and sarcasm. He is rarely serious and even makes sarcastic quips during battle.” </p>

<p>“Xigbar has a laid-back and cocky attitude and likes to taunt his opponents. When not on missions, he occasionally enjoys eavesdropping on his fellow Organization members. He relies heavily on instinct rather than on intelligence for both decision-making and fighting”</p>

<p>Regarding post #147</p>

<p>Stanford and Harvard are two different schools :-)</p>

<p>In your “corrective post” (post #136) you were focusing on the wrong percentage. Percent of class enrolled via EA/ED is what is important in this context, not the EA/ED acceptance rate. Unfortunately it is not included in the Common Data Set (CDS). Note that in post #98 you were also focusing on the wrong percentage. I think you are relying a little too heavily on instinct in this discussion :-)</p>

<p>In post #140 the data was fine, but you failed to disambiguate the term “admits”, so your methods were not obvious to me. No big deal, because I just went to the source for the CDS data, used another method and came up with a similar result. Just so you know, post #140 officially earned you the title of “CDS obfuscator”.
:slight_smile: (refer back to your post #126)</p>

<p>In post #140 I am puzzled as to why you chose to take the time to introduce a hypothesis that you yourself considered asinine. It would have been a lot less work to just note that USNews must have made a mistake in reporting that particular piece of data. :-)</p>

154

<p>To provide some perspective on percent of class enrolled via EA/ED, if one goes back to the time when you were learning how to spell SAT, Stanford actually was a lot closer to 17% than 41%. :slight_smile: </p>

<p>From a 2001 Atlantic article:</p>

<p>“Two other proposals sound sensible but also indicate the limits of reform. One is that colleges voluntarily do what Stanford does now and hold early admissions to no more than 25 percent of the incoming class. “I really would find it problematic to give out more than a quarter of our admissions decisions early,” Robin Mamlet, the admissions dean at Stanford, says, voicing a view different from Hargadon’s. “Certainly I feel that when you pass a third, you limit your ability to maneuver as an institution, and it’s not healthy on a national level.” Some counselors told me they support such a ceiling because they support anything that will reduce the volume of early acceptances. Others think a widely accepted ceiling could actually make things worse, by enforcing the idea that early admission is a sign of super-elite status. “</p>

<p>Back to post #140
Outside of Ziggyland, a “back of the napkin” calculation (where you fabricate data to validate your original hypothesis) is not considered a proof, it is considered a firing offense :-). This means that “thus far” you have not “answered” or “pointed” (whatever that means) anything.</p>

<p>Note that the Atlantic article suggests that there has been a dramatic increase in EA/ED percentage at Stanford (from less than 25% to 41%) it is just difficult to pinpoint exactly when. Note that this is a trend/tactic that dates back to the ‘90s with USC, the ‘80s with Penn and possibly earlier with some of the other top ranked Ivies/top ranked LACs.</p>

155

<p>From post #146
The fact that in this day and age you are questioning that there can be an interesting discussion relating EA/ED policies to selectivity suggests that your knowledge of the admissions process is more than a decade behind the times :-)</p>

<p>Again from the 2001 Atlantic Article:</p>

<p>“It does something else as well, which is understood by every college administrator in the country but by very few parents or students. The more freshmen a college admits under a binding ED plan, the fewer acceptances it needs from the regular pool to fill its class—and the better it will look statistically. That statistical improvement can have significant consequence.”</p>

<p>“From a college’s point of view, the most important fact about early decision is that it provides a way to improve a college’s selectivity and yield simultaneously, and therefore to move the school up on national-ranking charts. It will take a few paragraphs’ worth of figures to explain how colleges weigh early and regular applicants and who therefore does or does not get in at which point.”</p>

<p>“The statistical measures that matter here are a college’s selectivity and its yield. They are related, and both are taken as indicators of a school’s desirability. Selectivity measures how hard a school is to get into. A school that accepts one applicant out of four, like the University of California at Berkeley, is more selective than one that accepts two out of three, like UC Davis. To the extent that college admission is seen as a trophy, the more applicants a given college rejects, the happier those it accepts—and their parents—will be.”</p>

<p>[The</a> Early-Decision Racket - James Fallows - The Atlantic](<a href=“The Early-Decision Racket - The Atlantic”>The Early-Decision Racket - The Atlantic)</p>

<p>In general, I think there is an interesting discussion to be had around what has happened in this area from the time of the Atlantic article to the present as well as what might happen in the future. Papa Chicken has also presented some sources that give interesting perspectives from the “early days”.</p>

<p>From post #147
I interpreted your closing remark to mean that you were only interested in discussing yield data from your alma mata, so I managed to dig up a recent senior thesis from Claremont McKenna. It suggests that you are not the only one at CMC interested in the subject. The part I find most interesting is that the author calls a technique that is at least three decades old “clever” :-)</p>

<p>“Claremont McKenna recently released its admissions data for the class of 2015.
Overall CMC’s admissions office has the goal of attracting academically capable students who are going to fit CMC and each other well. Adam Miller, Associate Dean of Admissions, explained that a “fewer percentage of people were accepted early, but more applied, so a greater percentage of the total class was accepted early. That meant that we could accept a fewer number of people regular decision.”xix A total of 619 students were admitted to the class of 2015. Of these students, 145 were admitted early decision –that is almost half of the entire class. The admission rate “dropped a considerable 3.4 percentage points from 17.2% in 2010 to 13.8% in
2011.”xx</p>

<p>“Given the results of this research, it is safe to say that Claremont McKenna’s admissions office is doing a good job of mitigating risk. This was cleverly accomplished by accepting a greater percentage of the incoming class via binding early decision. This produces several benefits for the school. Effectively ED admits have no bargaining power in terms of financial aid packages. Additionally, uncertainty about tuition revenue is eliminated for half the class, before the regular decision applications are even processed. Also, CMC can be more selective in regular decision, bringing down the acceptance rate, an action that can raise prestige and ranking, and thus attract even more qualified applicants in the future. Lowering the acceptance rate is one way
to improve in the rankings. Raising yield is another. However, CMC did not do this. In fact, CMC expects a yield close to 33.7%, last year’s yield, for its regular decision applicants.xxi This seems to suggest that the admissions office has not found a way to improve yield.”</p>

<p><a href=“http://scholarship.claremont.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1206&context=cmc_theses&sei-redir=1&referer=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2Furl%3Fsa%3Dt%26rct%3Dj%26q%3Dclaremont%2520mckenna%2520freshman%2520enrolled%2520through%2520early%2520plans%26source%3Dweb%26cd%3D9%26ved%3D0CF4QFjAI%26url%3Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fscholarship.claremont.edu%252Fcgi%252Fviewcontent.cgi%253Farticle%253D1206%2526context%253Dcmc_theses%26ei%3DzIUOUfCTGee90QGR9oCoDQ%26usg%3DAFQjCNELOtOELE8utNmWWtT5rYaXhAil1w%26bvm%3Dbv.41867550%2Cd.dmQ#search=“claremont%20mckenna%20freshman%20enrolled%20through%20early%20plans”[/url]”>http://scholarship.claremont.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1206&context=cmc_theses&sei-redir=1&referer=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2Furl%3Fsa%3Dt%26rct%3Dj%26q%3Dclaremont%2520mckenna%2520freshman%2520enrolled%2520through%2520early%2520plans%26source%3Dweb%26cd%3D9%26ved%3D0CF4QFjAI%26url%3Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fscholarship.claremont.edu%252Fcgi%252Fviewcontent.cgi%253Farticle%253D1206%2526context%253Dcmc_theses%26ei%3DzIUOUfCTGee90QGR9oCoDQ%26usg%3DAFQjCNELOtOELE8utNmWWtT5rYaXhAil1w%26bvm%3Dbv.41867550%2Cd.dmQ#search=“claremont%20mckenna%20freshman%20enrolled%20through%20early%20plans”&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

156

<p>Back to Post #147</p>

<p>I would tend to agree that only a fool would attempt to compare the yield of one of the Claremont Colleges to a school that yielded Warren Buffet. :-)</p>

<p>I also find that intellectual arrogance is more likely to lead to foolish behavior than intellectual curiosity :slight_smile: </p>

<p>End of sarcastic humor binge.</p>

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<p>QUOTED:>>>> In your “corrective post” (post #136) you were focusing on the wrong percentage. Percent of class enrolled via EA/ED is what is important in this context, not the EA/ED acceptance rate. Unfortunately it is not included in the Common Data Set (CDS). Note that in post #98 you were also focusing on the wrong percentage. I think you are relying a little too heavily on instinct in this discussion :-)</p>

<p>In post #140 the data was fine, but you failed to disambiguate the term “admits”, so your methods were not obvious to me. No big deal, because I just went to the source for the CDS data, used another method and came up with a similar result. Just so you know, post #140 officially earned you the title of “CDS obfuscator”. <<<<</p>

<p>Say what? Critical reading not your strong point?</p>

<p>I am afraid that I cannot make it any clearer to you. Nor can I hold your hand further as you attempt to educate yourself and learn how to read data and the CDS. I provided you with correct numbers and the explanation. </p>

<p>I really tried to help you, but that seems futile. Just as it would be for me to read the rest of your sarcastic and non-sensical posts.</p>

158

<p>Thanks for your reply - Q. E. D.</p>

159

<p>Mastodon, I agree with your concern about the rising tide of early decisions. But (on another thread) I thought Xiggi made the interesting point that there is a sort of built in limitation to how high this pct can get. When I try to imagine or simulate some example of, say, 90% of a freshman class being taken early, I get weird anomalies. </p>

<p>The moral here may be, I think, that while both the situation and the trend is currently bad for regular applicants, there may be an end in sight.</p>

<p>BTW, I wanted to remind Papa Chicken that he thought he could produce a totals row at the end of his posts. Obviously, his list doesn’t include all colleges, but I think there may be a representative sample there of some of the fancier ones.</p>

160

<p>I may have started this debate with my comparison of Stanford and Harvard’s responses to the increase in early applicants. It’s well known that colleges use early decision to boost their yield. I haven’t seen statistics on it, but I presume that for prestigious colleges single choice early action produces nearly identical benefits.</p>

<p>Yield is very important for colleges in comparing themselves to peer institutions. Schools like Alaska Fairbanks and BYU serve unique student populations and schools like Harvard, Stanford and Yale do not consider them peers. [Yale?s</a> admission yield rate ranked 9th | Yale Daily News](<a href=“http://yaledailynews.com/blog/2013/02/06/yales-admission-yield-rate-ranked-9th/]Yale?s”>Yale’s admission yield rate ranked 9th - Yale Daily News)</p>

<p>As seen in the linked article, Yale claims that it doesn’t try to boost yield by taking an applicant’s interest into account. Harvard admitted it takes applicant’s interest into account in its 2006-07 CDS, but every year since has claimed that it no longer does so. Yet its high rate of early applicants admitted and deferred seems to belie that claim. (Other Ivy League schools like Brown continue to openly admit that they take expressed interest into account.)</p>

<p>Doing a back of the envelope calculation I projected that Harvard’s yield might drop to about 70% if they admitted the same percentage of early applicants as Stanford. If that’s right then Harvard’s significantly higher rate of admission for early applicants might be the only thing that’s keeping it’s yield competitive with Stanford’s.</p>

<p>The history debated above is interesting, but I am focused on that dramatic change Harvard made this year because this is the year that Stanford could actually surpass Harvard in both the yield and admit rate statistics, which would be significant on both accounts. It makes Harvard’s year over year increase in its early admits suspicious to me, as does the fact that Harvard has yet to release its total applicants figure.</p>