<p>Well that's weird...</p>
<p>I got waitlisted with a 2080 SAT and 2.76 GPA...</p>
<p>
[quote]
BTW, last year's class was close to Vandy in test score averages, and with this year's class likely to show a 30 point rise in the average SAT score, it might even pass up Vandy. None of that is particularly meaningful, however. They are both fine schools that are actually extremely similar.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Umm.. can you please give me a direct link that proves the SAT score rise? Oh, you can't, because everyone hasn't enrolled.</p>
<p>Extremely similar? Like.. how, exactly? Vandy and Tulane are both extremely different socially and academically. </p>
<p>Since you're so obsessed with rankings, I'd think #18 and #51 wouldn't be "extremely similar."</p>
<p>Admissions:</a> Vanderbilt University
Tulane</a> Admission: Getting Into Tulane</p>
<p>Not up to par.</p>
<p>Cool it, children.</p>
<p>Just because someone didn't apply to a school, that doesn't mean they aren't allowed to post on the school's forum. Doing that just gives people actually applying to that school another perspective on things.</p>
<p>And I know Steven didn't apply to Tulane. He's just fact checking you. I mean, it's a fact that Vanderbilt is harder to get into than Tulane. Just look at the admissions statistics that Steven posted. Clearly, Vandy has the higher scores. But Tulane is definitely a good school, though.</p>
<p>xSteven - You really make Vandy look bad, because they apparently accept students with no critical reading skills and then do nothing to correct the problem. First, I did not say I could prove it, I said likely. Kind of opposites in the context of my message, actually. I made the statement based on the reported 30 point rise last year, and the statements made by admissions both in their communications to accepted students and to me personally about this year's anticipated class. So you look pretty much like a fool regarding that point.</p>
<p>Second, and equally foolish, is your claim that I am obsessed with rankings. Can you show me where in my reply to you I mentioned rankings at all? In other messages where I mention rankings, I am simply trying to explain that all schools try to get their rankings higher (including Vandy, I bet) and USNWR sets the "rules" about how they do the rankings. Therefore schools play the game. In replying to your comment I did not mention rankings at all, and in fact basically said such statistics were not really very meaningful. What I meant by similar was that they are about the same size, are both private schools in the south, are both in urban areas, both have very bright and capable students on the whole, both are geared towards a broad liberal arts education at a research university, both have med schools and law schools, and despite your opinion to the contrary, one can get a very fine education at either institution. In my book, that is pretty similar. The overall stats belie your statement that they are "extremely different" academically, but then, you might have a much tighter definition of extremely. I completely agree that Vandy has better stats overall than Tulane, I did not say otherwise. I just said they were close. A relative term, I'll concede, but I suspect that if you plotted out the stats of all the universities in the country and calculated the mean and the standard deviations, Tulane and Vandy would be within one standard deviation of each other in nearly all categories. I take that as close. 2 SD's is considered close in science, and I absolutely guarantee they are that close, but I would be very confident it is 1 SD. I do hope you have taken statistics already.</p>
<p>I am not sure how you know that Tulane and Vandy are very different socially. Did you attend both? I don't think you can really know a school's social scene from a short visit. I bet Vandy kids study, party, do some drinking, have sex, join organizations, go to concerts, like sports (OK, Vandy has much better teams for sure, give you that one), etc. etc. Gee, so do Tulane kids. I won't even nitpick this point with you, it cannot be proven one way or the other. </p>
<p>I guess we can let the readers of this site decide who is not "up to par".</p>
<p>Hilsa - read xSteven's original post #37. That is what touched this off, and it is definitely not fact checking. And as I said in my latest post, yes Vandy is more selective than Tulane. I never claimed otherwise and it was never the point.</p>
<p>How do you know he did not apply to Tulane, just out of curiosity? And how exactly do you think, then, that #37 contributes anything substantive to the discussion people that are interested in Tulane are trying to have on here?</p>
<p>I know Steven personally.</p>
<p>And it's just another opinion. And to give another opinion, my parents said that Tulane was amazing school back in the day, but now it's reputation is waning, as trendy schools are making their way up the USN&WR rankings. Purdue is a similar example. And I'm sure Vandy's reputation will fall and Tulane's reputation again will rise, at some point in the future.</p>
<p>This whole thread is really weird. Am I understanding this correctly? The consensus seems to be that Tulane is waitlisting just about everyone so that later on they can only admit students who promise to come there? I've never heard of anything like this. I'm not trying to challenge anyone in any kind of confrontational way, but is there any kind of precedent for this? Has any other college ever done this before?</p>
<p>Well, Hilsa, Tulane has done almost nothing but rise in the last 2 decades, excepting the 2 years after Katrina. That is true by almost any measure you can think of. I hardly think a record number of applications, a 27% acceptance rate, and a 30 point rise in SAT score average along with similar rises in average GPA and class rank could be catagorized as "waning". I know they made the application free, but other schools that have free applications that are of similar size do not get this number of applications, so it is not just that, although it is a big factor for sure. And even if you take post #37 as "just another opinion", it really has no place on this site and comes across as extremely immature. Just my opinion.</p>
<p>bird rock - as I understand it Tulane is in a nearly unprecidented situation of having an extremely large number of students that applied EA and are considered very serious about Tulane. Perhaps it is because Tulane is very generous with scholarships and given the economy and everyone's college fund tanking....</p>
<p>I am really not sure, but it has to be something like that for Tulane to be doing this. I suppose we will find out at some point.</p>
<p>I don't believe it's correct that US News (arguably the "biggest" player in the ranking game) uses yield in it's calculation. Further, SAT/ACT scores and grades are weighted much more heavily than acceptance rate. From US</a> News & World Report - Breaking News, World News, Business News, and America's Best Colleges - USNews.com:</p>
<p>Student selectivity (15 percent). A school's academic atmosphere is determined in part by the abilities and ambitions of the student body. We therefore factor in test scores of enrollees on the Critical Reading and Math portions of the SAT or Composite ACT score (50 percent of the selectivity score); the proportion of enrolled freshmen (for all national universities and liberal arts colleges) who graduated in the top 10 percent of their high school classes or (for institutions in the universities-master's and baccalaureate colleges) the top 25 percent (40 percent); and the acceptance rate, or the ratio of students admitted to applicants (10 percent). The data are for the fall 2007 entering class. Whether the SAT or ACT was used in making these calculations was determined by which score was submitted most often at that school for fall 2007 admissions</p>
<p>I think this is a simple matter of the "early bird got the worm." Tulane received an unprecedented number of applications and did not significantly tighten the acceptance/scholarship criteria in EA. Therefore, until they sees how many of the previously accepted students actually enroll, they must waitlist some very qualified students they would otherwise love to have. </p>
<p>Can you imagine the uproar on this board come July/August if everyone suddenly found out they were squishing three kids into a dorm room that is barely adequate for two? I'm glad my d is off-campus at this point (where, by the way, she doesn't worry about the crime rate 24 hours a day :)). </p>
<p>There's no conspiracy here folks ... Tulane is a wonderful school for some kids. Others will be happier at Vandy, Emory, etc.</p>
<p>Jersey - excellent post, thanks for the research at US News. I erred in saying yield, I was merely trying to give the feel for how the game works and did it from memory. Minor error I think, the point is the same. As I said earlier and you imply also, those folks in admissions have a tough job, especially this year.</p>
<p>hi just wanted to let everyone know, my counselor talked to the tulane people today and they said it is a short waitlist and a great portion of the list will be accepted by may 1st. also, it was an extremely qualified pool who would have likely received scholarship money had they applied in early action</p>
<p>hmmm...I did apply early. I happened to check the status page and it has been updated to reflect waitlist status instead of deferred status. Thanks for sharing information.</p>
<p>Tulane appears to be on the rise! Will be interesting to see how it all pans out for the next ranking issues, although I still think those are only useful for comparing stats, not really knowing a school.</p>
<p>Fallenchemist, whose user name indicates many things i'm sure, please stop posting in this forum, you have too much times on your hands, stop posting 2 page responses that are helping no one</p>
<p>Quenched, who are you to criticize a fellow CCer? He may be a parent, but is also a Tulane alumnus who has provided meaningful insight with regard to student life, dormitories, etc.
By the way, who are you to criticize the quality of having excess time? Perhaps if you had used YOUR time more judiciously, you wouldn't have been placed on the wait list.</p>
<p>It's hilarious when people post complaining that people are wasting their time.</p>
<p>hahah frydfrog, good point!</p>
<p>Hey guys, thanks for the support, it is appreciated. But no worries, guys like quenched actually mean nothing to me (or anyone else, I am sure). There are always cowards and flamethrowers on the web. In fact, I rather suspect xSteven, hilsa, and quenched are the same person. No idea what I did to insult them (him) originally, but he is perfectly free to come here and keep making an ass out of himself. As for my time, he is probably a slow typist. It takes me all of 10 minutes to post the longer messages, and a few people seem to have found them useful. Although I don't thinkn there were actually any 2 pagers, lol.</p>
<p>I also noticed that quencher is posting on 4 year old threads, thinking that people there are still waiting to hear from Tulane, roflmao. Also claims Tulane is one of the most expensive schools in the country, when there are dozens if not a hundred that are the same +/- a thousand bucks, and considering that Tulane gives tons of merit aid compared to most of those others giving little or none, it is a good deal for people that deserve to go there (sly reference there). He said his friend got $28K, but as far as I know, other than the DHS, the max is $24K, but I am nitpicking there.</p>
<p>touche frydog, and fallenchemist I apologize, i'm just bewildered by the fact that Tulane can pursue someone so persistently only to wait list them. Furthermore, I had not seen the other posts that you had contributed to this forum... the reason for my outlash was for the feud you and that vanderbilt guy were having this which only frustrated me even more so after only minutes before finding out i was wait listed.</p>