This logic is flawed. Admitting many high stats kids would not help a college’s ranking if these kids do not enroll, because the 7% has to do with enrolled not admitted student stats.
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Acceptances from the WL were numerous in 2021 and very few in 2022. I’m sure a lot of managing enrollment is tied to what is happening with housing, registration for courses, space in certain programs that fluctuates, etc. (in addition to fluctuations in yield).
If you are on waitlists — as many will be, UC and otherwise — you still deposit and submit your SIR at a school you plan to attend. If you get admitted somewhere you are waitlisted, you just notify the other school (but lose that deposit, usually a few hundred dollars). It happens all the time.
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You can accept the waitlist as many as you would like. When May 1st comes, you can put a deposit at one university of your choice. It is typically $250-ish. If you come off the waitlist in June/July and decide to accept the spot, you will forego the $250 SIR deposit. That is all.
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I understand the difference between admitted and enrolled but the only way to increase enrollment of high-stats students is to admit more high-stats students, no?
The whole point of my post is to disprove the belief that high-stats kids are not admitted because of yield protection by colleges who want to climb the rankings. Many arguments on both sides of the yield protection debate for sure, but just want to point out that there are many ways for colleges to climb the rankings, just not the yield number since it is not factored into the rankings.
edragonfly, thank you for posting the exact USNR formula.
Not to put too fine a a point on things, but if a college cares about yield etc, actually two things need to happen 1. accept a high-stat kid 2. high-stat kid actually attends.
The admissions process is certainly opaque. My view is that colleges just want to do what they want and not have to explain themselves. This becomes more problematic when the colleges are receiving so much state and federal tax money. Their use and employment of the term holistic is just a new way to paper everything over.
I was at a introductory talk and tour at Columbia University, and the director of admissions asked the audience, who here knows what holistic means. I raised my hand and said “Less Asians?”
It’s frustrating when your high-stat kid gets denied, because you feel like you did everything they told you to do. My kid was a national merit semi-finalist, top 1% in California. My kid got 1570 on the SAT. Did everyone accepted at UCSC outperform her. Am I wrong to feel reactive even insulted that the only thing UC can offer her is waitlist, at their #7 campus? It feels unfair. Then again prop 13 is unfair, and I benefit from that, and in life we have to take the good with the bad.
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You keep talking about your child’s SAT score. The UC’s don’t consider it. It’s irrelevant. It does not help in admissions at all. The reason I know this is because my child didn’t even take the SAT because we knew the UC’s were test blind and she was offered admission.
I think the admissions process has actually shown that it is working in your case since you mentioned earlier that you consider UCSC a ‘safety school’. Perhaps something in your child’s application was evident of that which is why they put her on the waitlist?.
You seem to have a low opinion of UCSC by talking about overqualification and #7 school etc so I’m not sure why you are so interested in why your child didn’t get admission. She could still get an offer from any of the other UC’s she applied to.
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Understand your frustration, but there are more UC results coming. Likeky today for UCSD and UCLA. Next week perhaps UCSB, and UCB afterward. For holistic admission, anything could happened. Not being admited to UCSC right at this moment (or to any universities) doesn’t diminish her accomplishment. She will be where she meant to be. Her PIQs might not be align with UCSC mission perhaps. However, it might align with other UCs. But just to stress a point here, UCSC is not a safety school anymore. When a school has less than 50% admission rate (47.1% last year), it’s not a safety. There may be a higher chance for high stats students but when taking the holistic approach (i.e. considering factors such as fit, regions, income status, ECs, personal statements), the chance can be 60/40, 70/30, but never a 99% sure thing.
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Completely agree with you.
Also, sometimes college admissions is the first time some of these kids have ever failed/not succeeded at something and it hurts to watch your child be rejected. However, it’s something everyone has to go through in life and it makes you a more well-rounded person. It’s a hard, but good, life lesson.
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I totally feel for you and your frustration. I have two kids who went through the process. Both were high stats (almost perfect SAT score, all 5’s on AP tests), same high school, same ECs except the younger one had more passion projects related to major. One applied 2015 and the other applied 2020 and what a world of difference those 5 years made. First one was accepted everywhere except Harvard and Princeton and enrolled at Stanford. She was admitted to all the 5 UC’s she applied to. The second one didn’t even bother applying to Ivy’s or T20 privates, only OOS STEM flagships and 6 UCs. He had a 40% hit rate in terms of acceptance (which I was so thankful for given all the horror stories out there) and enrolled at UIUC. My personal theory is that given the explosion of apps each college is receiving the last few years, high stats no longer matter as much as they used to, especially at test blind schools like the UCs. I also believe there is grade inflation at many high schools and the number of 3.9 - 4.0 kids has steadily increased and many are in for a rude awakening when they receive their first B in college their very first semester or quarter. When so many kids with similar high stats are applying to impacted majors, AOs will look to essays and PIQs to determine “fit” and who best fit institutional goals and priorities which do not always translate to applicants with the highest stats. For example, they may have a goal of enrolling at least 10% of the class with first-gen students, so a 3.9 first-gen student may be admitted vs. a 4.0 non first-gen student may be waitlisted for the same major at the same college. All part of holistic admissions.
I now work with low-income, first-gen high school students through a 1:1 mentoring program. The program provides excellent training for college mentors like me and my advice to all UC applicants is to really spend a lot of time on your PIQs, starting the summer before senior year. Get feedback and iterate. This is the only way you can stand out since stats and activities (usually accomplished musician/athlete/club president) are so common these days. You need to be memorable and the best way is to choose the PIQ’s that showcase you the best and tell complementary stories about you. Also important is to strive for a balance of story-telling and reflection. The best PIQs are well-balanced between telling what happened and reflecting upon the event…what did you learn about yourself, the world and how did it shape or change you, your outlook and what you want to do in your future. If the essays are all story-telling or all reflection, they don’t showcase you as well as ones that are well balanced between story and reflection. Obviously, not going to help you or your student now, but if you have younger ones, you have more tools, knowledge and experience to help them. Not implying that your student did not have stellar PIQs, just advice to future students who hang out at CC forums.
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Absolutely.
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I agree with everything you said, however, in some cases the PIQs and essays are heavily edited and even written by hired counselors, parents, etc. That’s the reality. My kid has done everything 100% on her own. I hope the AOs are able to see that - and see through the professionally written essays and PIQs. I just tell my kid that in the long run, the fact that she has done everything on her own will serve her well, in college and beyond.
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Exactly what I told my kid.
You actually did all your extra curriculars with 100% dedication, they were not just a hogwash, neither were they done just for the sake of college applications. You actually wrote all your essays, all accomplishments are yours indeed and have helped you build skills for a lifetime. nothing can take away the learnings… they have helped shape who you are as a person.
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I think that you should also consider the fact that in eyes of the UC’s, your child isn’t ultra-high stat. You said earlier that she had a 4.0 gpa. There are some kids on here with much higher weighted gpas. Since they no longer look at SAT scores, that only puts her in amongst all the rest of the applicants.
The national merit semi-finalist is an awesome thing to have on your application, however not every child takes part so it isn’t a comparable attribute to other applicants. It is certainly a help for your child, but does not show any indicator of them being any more deserving of a spot that another child with a higher gpa. As that is what they are looking at. What was your child’s course rigor like? If they attended a high school that offered a lot of AP and honors courses but didn’t take them, then that will be a negative against them. They consider your high school and it’s competitiveness. Is she competing with other kids at her school who have taken more courses and have a higher gpa? Lots to consider.
Fingers crossed for her for some good news in the coming decsions from the rest of the UC’s.
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I’m not sure why you keep on mentioning sat. The uc’s are test blind. What they do see is weighted GPA piqs and extracurriculars. Was your child outstanding compared to the applicant pool in those areas? It is so then that’s real shame okay
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Your point on yield not being a factor in US News ranking is well-taken, although in some circles yield is definitely associated with prestige.
In addition, there are other reasons a college may engage in YP besides the rankings, predictability/planning, for example.
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Yield also affects bond ranking. Lower the yield, higher the bond rating, lower the interest rate for borrowing. But, this is really only applicable to private institutions, and one reason why we see the private universities so focused on yield rate. The UCs – as the most prestigious university system in the world – has the highest bond rating, and doesn’t need to worry about yield (at least for its bond rating.)
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I mean, I think whether we call it “yield protection” or something else, the end result is the same…a school that isn’t a T30 passed on a very high performing student. It does happen. This is my third student, all have scored 1560 or higher on the SAT. One NMSF, two commended. One played a piano recital at Carnegie Hall, the other is an Eagle Scout. They all were rejected by schools they hoped to go to. Not always obvious reaches. And they can barely remember it now. I’ve stopped trying to figure out the why…it doesn’t help. Time definitely will though.
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If I could like this whole post twice I would do that. Spot on. Future PIQ-writers, please read! Even great PIQs are no guarantee to get you in (again, holistic and lots of variables!) but in my estimation they are basically necessary to a strong application. As is the way you craft your Activities section. Needs to tell a story.
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I think actually the coverage for the PSAT (which doubles as the NMSQT) is quite extensive. What is a Good PSAT Score For The National Merit Scholarship? claims Every year, more than 4.5 million high school juniors take the PSAT/NMSQT. Out of these students, only 7,500 will be selected to be National Merit Scholarship finalists—less than a fifth of a percent of the original number of test takers. In today’s political environment, frankly I’m amazed they still get away with administering the test at all.
Guess I miss the good old days where they multiplied the GPA by the SAT to get an internal selection index. Well probably some colleges still do that.
Anyway… fingers crossed.
The UC application does not have PIQ and essays, only PIQ and up to 20 A&A.
I do not work in admissions but I read scholarship applications for a different university and can tell you what it looks like from my perspective. As a scholarship reader, I am not looking at the undergrad admission application. However scholarship applications have several sections similar to A&A and PIQ. I see everything that a student enters, but nothing that they don’t.
I can tell when something is copy and pasted from another application with a similar prompt. I can tell when the activity section is in one voice, sentence structure, level of maturity, style of writing, etc. and the short answers are in another. However, what I’m looking for is what the student did. I don’t care about the organization’ mission or what recipients of the student’s volunteer efforts got out of it. I’m looking for examples of the priorities and values that the scholarship sponsor wants me to look for.
For example, let’s say a scholarship wants me to look for students who took initiative. Sometimes students say it outright - “Realizing there was a problem, I took the initiative to…” and follow up with a description of what they did. Sometimes I have to look for ways in which they demonstrated initiative - “We could no longer meet in person so I set up Zoom meetings and sent invites to…” or “During the pandemic, my mother picked up a second job to help support the family. After school, I went to my sibling’s school and walked them home. I helped them with their homework, made dinner and put them to bed. I even attended the parent-teacher conference.”
The PIQ type questions could be beautifully written and detail very meaningful involvement, but if they don’t tell me (with examples) about the specific attributes that I’m told to look for, the student isn’t a right fit for that scholarship.
As far as students doing things 100% themselves. I agree that the grades, EC and writing should be done by the student. However, time and time again, students make mistakes on their applications. Having a second (or third) set of eyes read over the application before submitting, saves a lot of grief come March.
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