I think we were speaking of kids with 4.0s and 1500+ SATs, who are also varsity captains and class president…. I was anyhow. In my world, right or wrong, those are the kids I see applying to 20 schools this year. On paper they are a “match” for every single school out there.
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I respectfully disagree.
It may not increase your chances much but, because there is not 100% correlation in admissions decisions, it has to increase your chances.
Maybe one of the 20 admissions committee members takes a real liking to your essay, or was in a particularly good mood when he or she reviewed your application. There is enough randomness in the process that, even setting aside differences among the T20 in their preferences/needs in any particular year, applying to mutiple schools increases your chances.
And, for 4.0/36 kids, I think this is even more true. Distinguishing one 4.0/36 from another is more subject to randomness and differences among the T20 in their prefereneces and needs in a particilar year.
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Unless that B+ student who is not taking the most demanding courses in high school has a parent who is a megadonor at the additional top 20 college, their chances at top 20 colleges probably go from 0% to 0%.
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The effect depends on many factors. It’s not just a simple problem where if you want to go to a 92% rejection college, then a high stat applicant has a 1 - 0.92^20 = 81% chance of getting admitted somewhere, if you apply to 20 schools. Instead the decisions are often well correlated with oneanother. If something non-stat about your application is weak compared to other applicants, you may be highly likely to be rejected everywhere.
Different colleges look for and emphasize different criteria, so the specific chance of admission will vary by college, but it may be more desirable to choose colleges that are an especially good fit and./or you believe your chance of admission may be relatively larger, rather than applying to a huge number of colleges with little filter besides choosing colleges that are highly ranked/selective.
Another relevant issue is differences in quality of application as number of applications increases, which may change chance of acceptance for that school. For example, if a student who applies to 20 schools might put less average effort in to each application that a student who applies to 4 schools. The could include things like being less likely to show demonstrated interest at schools that consider this, or things like cut and pasting essays, perhaps sometimes forgetting to change the college name when pasting. Alternatively a student could also better master the process on later applications, such as getting used to interviews and doing better at them as he/she gains more experience. Again it depends on a variety of factors.
One can look at real anecdotal outcomes rather than theory by looking at decision outcomes threads in this forum, such as the one at Can more graduated seniors do "actual results" threads? - #2340 by Betseyt . For example, the most recent poster who applied to near 20 colleges had the following results. The acceptances occurred at colleges that tend to emphasize stats/rank, and the waitlists/rejections generally occurred at colleges that tend to place less relative emphasis on stats. I expect most of the acceptances could have been predicted well. Similarly I expect the poster could have got other acceptances at other colleges, had he applied to others that tend to emphasize stats, and place less emphasis on the application criteria he rated as his weaker arees.
Texas Resident planning to study CS
Stats – 4.0 with 14 APs
SAT – 1480
ECs – CS project with 10k+ users, Published research, Robotics, Varsity Track
LORs – Poster estimated as 5/10, 7/10, and 8/10
Essays – Poster estimated as 5/10Attending – UC Berkeley
Accepted – UC Berkeley, Texas A&M, UIUC (EA),USC, UT Austin
Waitlisted – Cornell, CMU, Purdue, GeorgiaTech (EA), Michigan, Rice
Rejected – Columbia, Dartmouth, Duke, Harvard, Northwestern, Penn, Stanford (REA)
That’s assuming the applicant can maintain the qualities of all her applications while increasing the number of them.
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Of course. I don’t think anyone is arguing that there is no correlation. My point is that the correlation is <100%, so it is not an indisputable fact to say that applying to 20 does not increase your chances.
Note that good fit in the view of the college may differ from that of the applicant. Top end applicants who want to study CS may think that MIT and CMU SCS are great fits for them, but the schools may be flooded with top end CS applicants and see humanities applicants to be better fits to round out their classes.
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Simon, if you think that spending time and money applying to a college where your chances are tiny-- and moreover, think that applying to 19 more of those-- is a good use of your time- go for it. I’ve been on CC a long time, and think that the misery posts we all see in April could easily be avoided by some very basic understanding of statistics. And I wish you’d invest as much zeal in falling in love with some realistic options- where they’d love you back- rather than playing the “my chances are close to zero but maybe some adcom will love my essay so much that my C in math and B’s in history and French and zero AP’s might get overlooked” game. Sure- it could happen. But we could also get wiped out by a comet overnight. Still means you should brush your teeth before you go to bed… a comet is not a zero probability event, but low enough so that the probability of tooth decay should come first.
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So you mean . . . there’s a chance. 
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I am not sure why you are making this personal.
I never said that applying to 19 more similar schools was a good use of my time, or of anyone’s time. My only point was that it is not an indisputable fact that it would not increase one’s admissions chances. Whether it is still a worthwhile exercise is a different question.
I agree completely that a basic understanding of statistics could inform discussions like these.
I have a working hypothesis, and am curious to see the data after this year.
In a world of test optional, there are students getting into T20 that previously wouldn’t. Students are also applying to more schools, but not getting into more schools. There is some additional randomness in who is accepted to the T20 just because the pool of qualified applicants has expanded (test optional) and grown (increased apps). The randomness means acceptances are distributed somewhat evenly among schools, and yet the number of acceptances any given student will be low. More kids overall get accepted to T50 schools, but fewer get multiple offers. So yield is higher than expected across the board because more students have an obvious front runner and over-enrollment ensues. T50 schools’ algorithms haven’t caught up yet to what is happening.
It looks like to me based on the CDSs currently available and other public reporting that last year’s college admissions resulted in over enrollment in many schools, but I don’t know if that is because of the increase of gap years or not - expect not, because the schools must have factored in gap years in their admissions plans. So I am curious what happens this year.
ED numbers are ever-increasing, so you’d think over enrollment should occur less as AOs lock in students and allot fewer slots to the big applicant pool. Just admit fewer RD and go to the waitlist to adjust. They must not have seen it coming because schools didn’t go to the wait list much at all.
Assuming I am right that over enrollment increased last year, it looks to me that the increased number of apps factored into it. So in theory the increased apps may not impact where any one kid gets accepted, but it can impact yield and how many students end up in a freshman class.
Just a theory.
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I would add to the discussion… there are a lot of neurodivergent kids out there (adhd for starters) who don’t always fit the typical mold for admissions to a lot of schools. Maybe not perfect grades, oftentimes below average test scores, yet they’re incredibly gifted and unique in non-academic areas. These kids have much more uncertainty in the admissions process and I’d argue there are many more out there applying than we realize. These kids are more likely to cast a wider net in applications. Many schools claim to use a “holistic” approach (which is awesome) but I’d argue it just makes it a lot harder to know what schools will notice about an applicant. Not all kids are applying to a lot of schools for vanity. Many are just unsure of where they will be noticed.
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Again, this is not the students a lot of people are talking about. What is your thought if the kid has the ability to pay, never had a B, is the captain of 3 teams, 36ACT, job etc….?
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I think very few are. It is the randomness mentioned above that has them cast such a wide net. It’s not for bragging rights.
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For most, at least, I don’t think it is for vanity and bragging rights … rather, it is more based on students’ own long-term goals, rational expectations, and/or as a countermeasure for game theory applied on them. The kids know what they are doing - good for them. And, to deal with the mental anguish, they deserve more empathy and a lot of support, IMO.
Seriously though, the random walk aspect of the admission processes, and especially for a batch of kids who have worked oh-so-very hard and also already know where they roughly are regarding their chances (i.e. for many who are above the rim based on their profiles, scores, best data analysis from past cycles, and additional insight based on research and determination of fit) is truly mind boggling. Here we are. Oh well.
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Agree that basic statistical information ought to be helpful but (a) colleges do not release data that is broken down in smaller batches of students with comparable academic record/rigor, test scores, etc but rather in averages or greater batches that do not allow insight and (b) the kids also know the Naviance charts - that should be somewhat helpful as a starting point to form rational expectations - are no longer accurate predictors of any outcome, especially for top colleges.
I am afraid that the only somewhat helpful data comes from incomplete, voluntary self-reporting of admitted students in CC, Reddit, etc. or well connected GCs.
Many responsible applicants research, think about all of those factors and make decisions accordingly, I think. CC input is also very helpful and especially for those who are going through it for the first time or not too familiar with particular colleges.
Even then, it is a shot in the dark, I am afraid.
That’s not what he is saying. He is just being accurate about the application of statistics. Unless there is 100% correlation, applying to multiple T20 schools increases the probability of getting admitted to at least one. This doesn’t mean it is a strategy worth pursuing for all of the other reasons articulated in this forum. But it does, factually, raise your chances unless you believe there is 100% correlation.
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A lot of schools do give waivers, even when not need-based. My student got a lot of offers for free applications based on his PSAT performance. He applied to almost 4x as many schools as I did back in the day (waaaaay back in the day…). It’s kind of bonkers.
I’m on an airplane, listening to a conversation where one person is bragging that their kid got into Michigan but got one upped by the kid who got into Northwestern
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There is no question there’s the neighbor factor. I
love my son. He’s an outstanding young man and he’s saving me a ton of $$ by going to Alabama for engineering. But he turned down Purdue with merit. And yes I wish he was there.
He is where he should be, where he wants to be. So why do I wish he was at Purdue? Clearly the neighbor factor.
I also point out my daughter is at #16 rank wise of #17 acceptances. I point out she got into W&L.
So all these factors are in play - I’m “justifying” her attending what quite frankly is the right school for her.
This is real - the neighbor factor - at least for many.
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