Its both - yes top 6% liberal arts majors probably don’t care about SAT being submitted or not, but I think many students and parents with SAT/ACT scores on the lower end of the range for McCombs, Cockrell, etc. probably holding those scores back because of test optional and betting on the “rest of the resume”.
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Test optional has some but little effect because score average excluding recruits was high even before test optional.
Auto admit law actually lowers the score average, real average is even higher. Many Texas public high schools have free (most mandatory) SAT day. Top ranking students not aiming for scholarships or competitive degrees just try once and submit knowing it won’t affect their admission. They don’t necessary be very bad as they do prepare for PSAT, but without preparation their SAT scores can be higher.
Last two cycles, majority of test optional applicants are non-auto (72%), most may be lower scores hoping to get in via holistic review.
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I’d concur prior to test optional - but now there are basically no more low scores in the pool of admitted applicants other than top 6% who score poorly. Test optional has skewed the scores higher by eliminating most if not all low scores that possibly could have been admitted.
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That exactly happened to son’s high school, top students already had colleges in the bag and they knew UT lacking merit based grants they didn’t prepare for school SAT. Many of them had higher scores in PSAT than the school SAT and they submitted scores on exam day.
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People are saying it will come out ON Feb 1, has that happened before? I feel like it was typically before.
A few posts up there is a link to an admissions consultant blog who goes over the last few years’ timelines but in general it seems like the last 2-3 Friday evenings in January there are substantial numbers of decisions released. Anecdotally, that has been our experience and most others at our local high schools, the vast majority find out the last two weeks in January.
UT does this in a very frustrating manner, they should probably go to some sort of set dates of decision releases IMO vs. everyone stressing from Thanksgiving to Feb. 1st about when they might find out. This is one thing A&M does better than UT.
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It is horrible for student mental health, yet they boast on the mental health of students on campus! Very contradictory!!
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Have there been any non-auto general history major acceptance this year that anyone is aware of?
My daughter, and many of her fellow students, didn’t hear from A&M last year until spring break (end of March). We were on a school trip to Hawaii at the time and man, there were a lot of disappointed kids (they were all either CAP/PACE or rejected)
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So for the 13% or so of non-auto admit holistic applicants that get accepted, I wonder what the average SAT/ACT score is when you remove auto admits from the equation. Given that test optional applicants are not going to submit even borderline scores, the scores that are submitted by holistic applicants have to be really high. Substantially higher than the 29-33 ACT range from the past couple of years of auto and non-auto admit applicants. Would that number not be on par with some Ivy League schools?
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Rank is still most important, then score. High score alone is not sufficient.
Ivy League also heavily look at rank, then scores. But comparing in-state, auto top 2% with high scores. Last few cycles was easier to get into Ivy League than UT competitive majors like Comp Science it goes down to affordability and financial aid.
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OK, understood. But typically A&M reviews applications as they come in and if they deem you qualified to be admitted to say Mays Business School in October, they let you know right then not wait until they get everyone’s applications in and stack them against each other and then make a call in January. Same for engineering. Yes, some have to wait longer but they give a priority to those who apply earlier as I understand it and they do fill up.
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My oos current longhorn got her acceptance on her portal last year on Thursday, January 27th in the evening around 6pm. Good luck to all!!
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My son got accepted into Electrical Engineering on Jan 25 around 7PM last year. Best wishes to you all.
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Does anyone who applied to the 40 Acres Scholar Program know when we’ll hear back? The website says that if you didn’t progress stages they won’t contact you at all, so if that’s the case for me has anyone heard back at all?
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For everyone whose kids applied to education: what major did they apply to? My daughter applied to Physical Culture and Sports and i’m trying to see if that is common or not.
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Mine applied to early childhood education. That sounds like a great program.
Mine applied early childhood ed as well, but I know some people that applied Physical Culture!
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Hi All! Just curious with all of these stats posts going around. If I’m understanding correctly, UT considers rank to be most important, then scores, then everything else I guess. Anyway, here’s my thought. Since all schools are not created equal…how do they handle very competitive high schools? My daughter has a 3.8 u/w and 4.4 weighted gpa. She received a 35 on the ACT and a 1450 on the SAT (she only took it once…near perfect math score), but she is only top 25%. Top 10% at our school regularly go Ivy League and likely don’t apply to any state schools. How does UT handle this type of situation? And what do you think her odds of getting in to engineering? We are OOS btw. 13 APs including calc ab/bc, all physics, chem, Econ, all history classes, govt, etc. Mostly 5s with a few 4s on history AP exams. she is team captain of varsity sport and spends 25 hours per week in competitive sport outside of school, lots of other STEM activities, and lots of community service. Thanks!
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Out of utter curiosity, what if someone has self reported scores on their common app profile but have chosen to go test optional. Will this impact to candidate in any manner?