It’s in North but it’s kinda expensive
My D is attending a top-ranked private high school in the U.S. Whether believes or not, Students who consider UChicago are considering Cornell, too. UChicago is the school which the thrid level gpa group students consider. HYPSM, definitely are considered by the first top level gpa students. Counselors don’t allow the third gpa group students to apply HYPSM.
Second gpa group may apply Columbia, UPenn, Brown. etc. Even if the us news ranking of UChicago is the third, the huge gap in between the students who apply HYPSM and UChicago exists. So I can’t feel its US news ranking actually.
@regina2017 - what’s the UChicago placement rate at your school for those third level GPA kids? Do they all get in, are they all deferred/waitlisted or what is the percentage accepted?
@JBStillFlying : My D school is one of the feeder school of UChigago. Acceptance rate is higher than 30%. There was No school all are guaranteed to accept. 10+ students are matriculated to UChigago every year. The # of accepted students are higher than #of matriculated students.
@regina2017 - I met one or two families whose kids are at feeder schools with several acceptances each year :). While the accept rate for class of 2021 hasn’t been released, we heard from the dean of admissions that it’s “around 8%” (some are reporting just under). That’s a higher rate than HYPS, I think, though not sure about this year specifically. In any case, USNews uses several factors to arrive at the ranking, not just accept rate or matriculation.
The most accurate ranking system based on the criteria of acceptance and enrollment would be determined by the enrollment choices of the kids accepted to both types of schools. If, for instance, more kids choose UChicago over Yale, then UChicago should be ranked higher. Those I know who are “in the know” claim that HYSP still outranks UChicago using that standard, but that Penn/Columbia/Brown don’t necessarily. This might also be outdated information, of course, since it’s based on trends at least a few years old by now.
@regina2017 Getting into HPYSM is not at all about GPA’s. My daughter also attended a top private prep school and the kids that are attending Stanford for example, were not even in the top 10 of the class, but were involved in national science competitions and math competitions. They were also presidents of several clubs, but did not have the best grades. Of the students who got accepted into Harvard, only one out of 4 was a top student in the class; the other 3 had legacies, and one of them was not even in the 20% of the class. UChicago kids (4 of them were in the top 10% of the class, and my daughter was top 2%) on the other hand, are all very academic, intelectual, with great personalities, and are very nice kids. My daughter just moved to UChicago last week (she turned down UPenn, Columbia and Cornell and four more top schools). She is not happy, she is extremely happy. She already has lots of friends, the campus could not be prettier, her dorm is amazing, the housing system has no parallel. She has already visited two museums, went to two plays (one in the city and the other in campus), and a jazz concert in campus; they ate in a Vietnamese restaurant, all in 6 days (classes start on Monday, and I guess (and hope) fun (yes, those are the meaning of fun in UChicago) will slow down). She would not survive in a school in the middle of nowhere or in a place with no cultural life. All the fuss with rankings is nonsense. The best university is the one where your kid will be happy, will grow, and will have the best possible life. My son attended a summer program in Princeton. It is a spectacular campus, but you will not find even one decent place to eat around it. Yale and Princeton could be super top universities, but not for everyone. Being 24/7 in campus with no options around is not for everyone.
@JBStillFlying : I think discussion about the acceptance rate of UChicago from my D school is meaningless because it depends on schools. However it is the fact. The counselor SHOWED us the acceptance rate 2 weeks ago. Even I have a picture of it 
Well, In my school, No body choose Uchicago over Yale because they know the gap of the applicants. But I may say it depends on students. I don’t know students of other schools. you may feel my info be outdated but sorry:) . it is very updated- 2 weeks ago info from the counselor. And if I mention a certain case , you may be shocked . The story about a student in the second GPA band who matriculated to Uchicago, You can’t believe the behind story of the student. It happens because UChicago is the third band school in my D’s school Who will tell UChicago is the third gpa band school if their DD are attending UChicago ?
Overall, UChicago is one of the great schools but can’t beat HYPSM even its us news rank is 3rd.
Have a good Sunday!
@regina2017, you should know that anecdotal information at one high school is rather meaningless.
For example, in our high school, the kids that got into HYPMS were ranked lower than my D, whose top choice was UChicago. Using your logic, this means that second tier kids apply to HYPMS. Now do you see the fault in your logic?
Anecdotally, of the two kids who got into both Yale and chicago in our child’s school,in the last two years one went to Yale and the other to chicago. At that level, it is more a matter of fit, personality, environment and subject focus than anything else. I can tell you categorically that chicago trumps columbia and penn and certainly brown, Dartmouth and Cornell at our school in cross admits. Chicago always loses to H, S and P. MIT Is not in the picture at our school.
“Overall, UChicago is one of the great schools but can’t beat HYPSM even its us news rank is 3rd.”
Opinions and perceptions.
QS Ranking 2018 has UChicago over Princeton and Yale.
Even though rankings use facts, they rank differently. Imagine personal opinions. There is no absolute truth. Comparing colleges and universities, for example, will always be like comparing apples, oranges, and grapes.
While we are the subject of anecdotal evidence:
What’s interesting are the kids we know with the perfect 4.0 uwGPA / 36 ACT who DON’T get into Stanford or Harvard simply because they aren’t an athletic or other hook. My niece isn’t top band GPA at her school but awaiting a LL from an Ivy and has been told by the coach that she’s getting in (we’ll see about that one . . . ). Her subject tests were solid and her ACT was pretty good but it wasn’t quite at the mid 50% range for UChicago’s class of 2020 (or that Ivy’s either). This wouldn’t fly as much at UChicago which is not a D1 school and where you simply have to be able to keep up with the rigors of the curriculum (and GPA, course rigor and test scores tend to be highly correlated with that preparation). What does this all mean? Well, given the heavy recruitment for D1 athletics at some Ivy’s or at Stanford, if you are NOT in a sport, you have to have super high test scores and GPA. Perhaps that’s what’s going on at @Regina2017’s school. Of course, if it’s Lab she’s talking about, a whole bunch of those kids get out of Hyde Park -
and IL - to begin with.
Harvard’s mid-range ACT is the same as UChicago’s for the class of 2020; its SAT’s are a tad higher. However, at that range @Carino is correct - they are looking for other stuff than GPA and test scores.
I think it’s great that someone at @Regina2017’s school decided to break out of his/her “band” and go with the best fit. Doubt it’s all that shocking to most of us with kids in “first band” GPA who are at UChicago this year LOL. Hopefully that 2nd’bander will return to high school as an enthusiastic recruiter for UChicago and encourage some more original thought among the up-and-coming seniors 
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@JBStillFlying I am looking at the profile of Lab matriculating class. For the last 4 years Lab sent the biggest number of high school seniors to The College. Lab indeed is the biggest feeder school to U of C itself.
https://www.ucls.uchicago.edu/uploaded/publications/La_hs_profile_2016-17.pdf
If U of C is not even the top 2 levels of choice for students at HADES or other top private schools along the east coast, so be it. I remember reading in Princeton Review an admission officer from Yale says that he believes 75% of the applicant pool are actually qualified to enroll at Yale. The difficult task for him is to select a class of 10% from that 75%. So what if, for example, top 2 level of Hotchkiss seniors do not want to apply to U of C, is that the end of eligible student pool for The College? I don’t think so.
Fundamentally, I think U of C has done enough marketing already to let the whole country to be more aware of the excellence of its undergrad program. If it can’t change the mind of some top private schools college admission counselors, then that is life. I think there is still a big enough pool of applicants to select a class of highest academic standard but with character that still fulfill the core belief of U of C intellectual spirit.
@85bears46 stay calm. Uchicago is one or two or three this year at Horace Mann, Collegiate,Andover, Philips, Brearely, – as tippy top east coast as it gets.
@regina2017
That idea of first, second, and third bands of GPA’s and its relation with college acceptances is so unrealistic.
@85bears46 - I stand corrected. Shows what happens when you go off anecdotal evidence 
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@Chrchill I know. Over last few weekends I have compiled some data on private school matriculation statistics. On paper at least U of C is among the top choices for many private schools senios along east coast. But I am not in the hallway among the seniors. Nor am I with the college admission counselors. So I cannot say whether U of C is indeed in the second or third or fourth tier of choice.
In the final analysis, as my previous post stated, I think there is a big enough pool of qualified and motivated U of C applicants to the point that it is irrelevant whether they are third or fourth tier candidates.
There is a lot of discussion in this thread about how beautiful the UChicago campus is, how wonderful the dorms are, how great the food is, etc. All of that is great to hear! I’m on the outside looking in though, because I’ve never been to Chicago, so of course I’ve never seen the university. I’m genuinely happy for all of the students that were accepted by UChicago and who are thorougly enjoying their college experiences.
But here’s the thing: I don’t think that I’ve seen anybody comment yet on safety in the surrounding areas. Chicago, after all, has an atrocious murder rate right now. Just absolutely, phenomenally horrible. Is UChicago completely insulated? Is there any concern at all for the safety of the students when they go off campus and explore the culture that Chicago has to offer? It just seems really weird to me that crime isn’t at least acknowledged and addressed in this thread, when Chicago is so dangerous (or at least parts of it are). Is this an elephant in the room that no one wants to talk about? Anyway, I could have missed a post or two that takes on this issue, and I apologize in advance if I have.
There is still a strong preference for East Coast kids to stay in the East, Midwest kids to stay in the Midwest, etc. If UChicago is #3 among tippy-top east coast prep schools that’s actually super good since HYPM as well as Columbia and Penn are all in the East. Harvard’s breakdown is nearly 40% New-England/Mid-Atlantic, 10% Midwest. Yale: 41% NE/MA, 12% Midwest. MIT 30% NE/MA, 11% Midwest. Stanford doesn’t breakdown any region outside its own state, while Princeton doesn’t seem to provide any sort of geographic distribution at all (suggesting that it might be heavily skewed to the NE/MA regions). Throwing in Penn and Columbia for good measure, we can see the same disparity (if not more so) - those two schools draw overwhelmingly from the New England/Mid-Atlantic regions relative to the Midwest.
Looking at UChicago you see a different picture: about one-third comes from New-England and Mid-Atlantic, but just over a quarter from the Midwest (class of 2020 stats). In other words, UChicago is attracting more kids from the East than it is from the Midwest, and certainly more than the tippy-tops in the East are attracting top Midwesterners. Two reasons might be population density differences (although how much that impacts the top of the HS achievement curve I can’t say) or cultural differences in preferring private college vs. the state flagship (again, not sure how much that affects the top of the curve). If either of these factors is, indeed, relevant, we should see similar geographic diversity represented by other Midwest elite schools: NU, WUSTL, and UND, for instance. Thing is - we don’t. Neither NU nor WUSTL provides a geographic breakdown at all (again, suggesting heavy concentrations of their local region?), while UND shows a little over a third from the Midwest and 38% from East AND South (combined).
This seems to speak particularly well of UChicago. It seems to draw top kids from a wider geographic area than either top schools in the East or Midwest. Is it the most geographically diverse of all the elites? That’s a question for another poster.
@whatisyourquest - The topic of safety and crime has been addressed time and again on other threads.
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Agree with @JBStillFlying on crime and safety. In a nutshell, U of Chicago is like any urban university. Students need to exercise caution. Hyde Park is not a suburbia utopia. But it is not unsafe by any urban standard.
The areas where most of Chicago homicides happen are far away from Hyde Park. And the violent crimes frequently occur after midnight during the weekend. An undergrad will not normally go to 123rd and Halstad at 1:00 am on Saturday.