What are my chances of getting into Accounting?

Colleges and Universities A-Z The University of Texas at Austin
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<p>Sorry this is kind of long.</p>

<p>I'm going into 12th grade this year. I went to a high school in Texas for all four years, but I'm Canadian and have never lived in the US before then. Basically, I kind of overestimated my classes (the high school in Canada that I originally planned on going to was very, very competitive), so I didn't take many Honors/AP classes or have any extracurriculars in 9th grade. Here is my info:</p>

<p>AP exam scores:
Statistics - 5
English - 4
Drawing - 4
French - 3</p>

<p>Extracurriculars:
National Honor Society
National Art Honor Society (grades 10-12)
French Honor Society (grades 10-12)
French Club (grades 10-12)
I also volunteered for about 25 hours.</p>

<p>My classes (we take 7 classes per year):
9th grade: 2 of 4 available Honors/AP classes
10th: 4 of 6 available Honors/AP classes
11th: 5 of 6 available Honors/AP classes
12th: 6 of 6.5 available Honors/AP classes
(I never took Honors/AP social studies classes...)</p>

<p>Grades in Honors/AP classes: 5 Bs, 17.5 As
Grades in regular classes: all As
GPA for grades 9-10: 3.75 (5.18 weighted)
Rank for grades 9-10: 9.6%
SAT score: 2100
I think my school is fairly competitive (2nd most competitive in my county), and the AP classes were pretty hard (besides the 1st most competitive school, other schools' classes are apparently really easy in comparison). If that makes any difference.</p>

<p>Can anyone please give some insight on how good my chances are of getting in? Thanks in advance.</p>

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<p>Decent chance. It’s mostly about the class rank for Accounting/McCombs.</p>

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<p>Wow…so class rank is more important than even SAT score?
Thanks for the reply.</p>

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<p>What is your class rank now? You say

but it knowing the overall is helpful.</p>

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<p>My school doesn’t release our updated ranks (for grades 9-11) until September or October of this year, so that’s all I have to go by for now, sorry.</p>

<p>I’m pretty sure that my GPA has increased, but my school recently started a Math and Science Academy and more competitive students transfer in each year, so it’s hard to say. I’d guess that it’s probably slightly higher (maybe about 9%).</p>

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<p>Those academy departments really hurt the other students in the school because usually academy students get to take AP courses their freshman year of HS. UT is auto admit at 7% now because of how many students are applying. However with the extra curricula’s, and everything else I’ve read on your thread I’d say that you have a strong chance of getting in.</p>

<p>80% of the incoming students HAVE to be filled by Texas’ top 10% rule. It just so happens though that the school receives soooo many applications that they end up admitting 7% so that it doesnt go over 80% of admitted students. So basically the school is allowed to admit the top 7% up until it hits 80% of its enrollment. The remaining 20% is at the schools discretion between out of state students, internationals, transfers, and other HS students who were not top 7</p>

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<p>Actually it is 75% not 80%. According to the UT website:
“The University is to automatically admit enough students to fill 75% of available Texas resident spaces.”</p>

<p>Not a big difference but it creates a few more spots for review applicants.</p>

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<p>OP, in my opinion, your odds are above 50% maybe even above 80% – again, just my opinion. </p>

<p>The two big predictors for academic success at the college level are GPA/Rank and ACT/SAT score with a slight edge in most empirical studies going to GPA/Rank; however, both are massively statistically significant. While different schools slightly differ in the relative weights given to each, I suggest you keep it simple and just assume that both are treated about equal. You appear strong on both measures. </p>

<p>(These studies are typically limited to examining only freshman grades and not long-term success. As such, take the results with a ‘grain of salt’. What goofs up these studies from an econometric standpoint are (1) the two variables are highly positively correlated with each other making attributing inference to each variable difficult and (2) the ‘outliers’ – high GPA/Rank, low ACT/SAT score and low GPA/Rank, high ACT/SAT score. </p>

<p>What’s the more desirable marginal student to admit? High IQ & slightly lazy or hard working, but a possible lower intellectual upside? Some schools prefer to take flyers on the high IQ kids figuring that some will figure it all out and be exceptional. While other schools abhor admitting anyone with a risk of flaming out due to evidence suggesting an insufficient work ethic. Knowing accounting well, I think McCombs should place a larger emphasis on GPA/Rank for accounting while fully taking into account the quality & nature of the high school. For say, physics or math, I think the ACT/SAT score is the better predictor.)</p>

<p>For what it’s worth, the undergraduate accounting program at UT is routinely ranked either #1 or #2 – flipping places with Illinois from time to time over the last 2-3 decades. Even if you later decide that accounting is not your passion, an accounting degree from UT together with passing the CPA exam can help open other doors in the business world. Many accounting majors I’ve known over the years went onto law school while others did the 3-year CFA cycle while working. Very, very few actually made it to the partner level at one of the Big accounting firms. </p>

<p>Accounting is not a program for those adverse to long hours of studying, but there are rewards on the back end. </p>

<p>For the record, I am of the opinion that the current form of the X% rule in Texas needs modification. The 75% cap helps, but is still too high. One could impose a minimum ACT/SAT score for automatic admission (ACT >= 26?) and fix many of the problems. Though helping to improve certain measures of ‘diversity’, the current rule forces numerous high GPA/Low test score ‘outliers’ into the UT student population, and as such, the rule if flawed.</p>

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<p>@FormerProf I’ve always had that feeling too. Impose a minimum test score on the auto-admits. A 26 ACT seems pretty reasonable. Lowering the admission percentage a little too would be helpful to keep the university at a higher level. </p>

<p>Auto-admit students in the top x% to fill 65% of the class as long as they meet the minimum test score requirements of 25ACT/1700SAT.</p>

<p>Although all of the diversity clan will say it will hurt diversity no matter what changes are made.</p>

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<p>I was thinking about automatic admission at UT late last night.</p>

<p>Besides lowering the cap down from 75% into, say, the 60-65% range, I’d suggest a sliding scale along these lines for automatic admission:</p>

<p>Top 5%, ACT >= 26
Top 6%, ACT >= 27
…
Top 10%, ACT >= 31
Top 25%, ACT >= 32</p>

<p>So, no auto admit unless the ACT >= 26. However, those not in the top X%, but still in the top 25%, can offset their lower rank with a standardized test score at 98th percentile or higher (ACT >= 32). (A more accurate version would only consider the English & Math scores, average just these two, and impose minimums on both. The data indicates that the predictive power of the Science & Reading sections are materially lower than for English & Math. This is why the Aggies have a 27 minimum on both the English & Math section scores as part of their auto admission ‘grid’.)</p>

<p>All others get the ‘holistic’ review. To keep the racial & socioeconomic makeup of the university crudely in line with the population of the state, I’d crudely ‘quota’ by school district, not race, in the ‘holistic’ process. There is merit to the argument that, say, an ACT of 24 or 25 from a bottom 10 rated school district might equal scoring a 26 or 27 in a top 10 rated district – this is driven by these tests being primarily a test of learned knowledge and not IQ. If the test score is truly ‘too low’ (e.g., 21 or 22?), then the learned knowledge gap is likely so large that the student is better served starting college at a place like UTSA or a community college and, if they excel, transferring into UT a future date.</p>

<p>I see zero rational or legal basis for using ‘race’ directly as a factor. Since school district is often (highly) correlated with race, a degree of racial diversity can still be maintained by using it as a factor in the holistic process. I agree with John Roberts: the best way to end discrimination on the basis of race, is to stop discriminating on the basis of race. </p>

<p>I want to accomplish 3 goals: (1) truncating the bottom tail of the distribution, (2) keeping more of the high achieving students in state, and (3) keeping UT as the ‘state’ school of Texas. Currently, the 25th percentile ACT score is a 25 and the 75th percentile score a 31. This bottom 25% gets dominated by scholarship athletes and automatic admission students. The special rules for top athletes are not going to change, but the rules for automatic admits can be changed.</p>

<p>I’d prefer to raise the 25th percentile to, say, an ACT of 27. Putting all students not meeting the grid I suggested above into ‘holistic’ review will put ALL ‘outlier’ students (high Rank/low test score & lower Rank/high test score) into the same ‘holistic’ review bucket. The admissions committee can then tweak the process each year to achieve the 3 goals I listed.</p>

<p>Unfortunately, I fear that all of the above is over the heads of much of the political class in both parties in the state …</p>

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<p>That makes total sense to me. I really like the sliding scale. The lower the HS rank the higher the test score needed for admission. Then holistic review of the ones that did not meet the minimum requirement. Lowering the 75% target to 60-65% would help increase the quality of the university while still maintaining the diversity that seems to be a goal.</p>

<p>I know my son would really like it. He is not an auto-admit since he is around the 11% mark. (Our guess from a non-ranking high school.) But he has a 35 math and a 35 English sub-score. If something like this existed then he would be admitted to UT. He is an academic admit to A&M since they do have at least something similar to the above.</p>

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<p>FormerProf - I would like to see your post in its own thread for more discussion and not to take away from Lauraine’s post. And under your proposed admission criteria Lauraine would be admitted.</p>

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<p>FormerProf and kldat1: I agree, that would be a much fairer system…The thing I’m the most worried about now in terms of getting admitted is definitely class rank.</p>

<p>Thanks to everyone for the help.
Also, does anyone know how much the quality of my essays will influence my chances of getting admitted?</p>