With all the recruited athletes, legacies, URMs, and developmental case all jamming in the ED, the odds for a regular applicant are minuscule.
Also, that’s not how statistics work. Admissions rates are not probabilities; they are just proportions. Just because a school has a 15% acceptance rate does not mean that you, personally, have a 15% chance of acceptance. Your probability might be higher or lower than that depending on your profile. Whatever it is, though, it’s completely unknown.
^^^^I just came on here to post this exact thing. The overall acceptance rate is not the same as an individual’s probability of getting accepted. If you throw heads 8 out of 10 times, the next coin toss still has a 50% chance of coming up heads, not an 80% chance. Okay, not a perfect analogy, but you get the idea.
With the info provided, I would suggest the 30% option. The odds shift a lot more than the 2x it looks like because the applicant pools are different.
I would only recommend Harvard if you could explain why it would be better for you, and why you have a realistic shot at it. Otherwise take the better bet.
Again, more CC dancing on the head of a pin. I doubt that applicant pools are markedly different at the level the OP is talking about. Really, you could take all of these schools, scramble the applicants and acceptances, and it’s all the same thing at any 10,000 foot level. Time to get real.
For any applicants or potential applicants out there are reading this, the quoted advice is incorrect and misleading.
Acceptance rates published by colleges show the number of acceptances divided by the number of applications. They do not indicate any individual’s so-called “chances”.
If acceptance rates did show chances, then if there were 10 applicants and 2 were accepted, the math would be that 2 applicants had a 100% chance, 8 had a zero percent chance = overall chance of 20%. How useful is that?
An applicant to an academically selective school with a 2.5 GPA, 1650 SAT, no ECs, and no hooks has a different probability of being accepted than another applicant who has a 4.0, 2350, is a high-school all-American athlete and a legacy.
Lots of people do…really…have much more of a chance beyond the published acceptance rates
@Pizzagirl “Again, more CC dancing on the head of a pin. I doubt that applicant pools are markedly different at the level the OP is talking about. Really, you could take all of these schools, scramble the applicants and acceptances, and it’s all the same thing at any 10,000 foot level. Time to get real.”
For the purpose of the admissions game they can be different, even if they are not very different in reality. I know you don’t like that PG, but it is what it is. The facts are that a student with nearly perfect grades, most rigorous schedule, a 2300+ SAT, and two 750+ subject test scores, is increasingly unlikely to be admitted to Harvard or Stanford without an additional differentiator. Solid, but ordinary ECs are unlikely to be enough: club participant, played a sport, and did some volunteer work, plays in a band.
However, that same student will have a good chance at schools in the 30% early admission range like Cornell, Boston College, Notre Dame, Johns Hopkins, Tufts, or Northwestern. These schools may also reject a student with these credentials from time to time, but they will do it with less frequency.
Where the “dancing on the head of a pin” becomes relevant is in thinking about what a student is really losing if they apply early to Northwestern, or Cornell instead of Harvard. For most applicants, in most majors, the differences are negligible, it would make a lot of sense for them to apply to Cornell or Northwestern because they are amazing schools, where they are much more likely to be admitted.
Regarding 6.1% ED at Columbia: That is the figure given by the admissions officer last week when we attended an info session. Yes, I may have misunderstood that he was giving the RD percentage but he was discussing ED at the time and said there was no statistically significant advantage on admission to apply ED. He strongly urged applicants to only use ED if Columbia was their first choice and wanted to know early.
What I would do is to take a basic statistics course.
My kid’s school’s naviance data shows that this ED strategy has been quite successful for students with the indicated profile. While nothing in college admissions is 100%, this approach, at least for now, seems like a sound strategy for those who can afford the university and feel that it fits their objectives. I think it’s a lot more sensible than chasing after HYPMS early action.
@Sportsman88 Columbia’s ED rate was not 6.1%…more like 18.5%.
Anyone in a school district where there is sufficient Naviance data such that there are sufficient people who have applied to these schools and from whose results conclusions can be drawn is already in a situation that is nowhere near representative of the average high school in America. Of the 30,000 hs in this country, how many fit that description - 500? Maybe 1000? All either elite private schools, academic magnets or wealthy suburban publics.
@pizzagirl “Anyone in a school district where there is sufficient Naviance data such that there are sufficient people who have applied to these schools and from whose results conclusions can be drawn is already in a situation that is nowhere near representative of the average high school in America. Of the 30,000 hs in this country, how many fit that description - 500? Maybe 1000? All either elite private schools, academic magnets or wealthy suburban publics.”
True, but I am not sure what you are saying about the OP’s situation.
I think that for many outstanding students, it is wise to consider applying early to a school that has a higher ED rate, but is still amazing, like Cornell, Northwestern, or Penn, instead of using it on Harvard. This will improve their odds of admission, and they will still get an amazing education. What do you think?
This student needs to pick an early school to apply to that is his top choice…not one based on the statistics of admission.
If Harvard is his top choice…fine. If 30% admission rate is his top choice…fine.
But picking solely on the admission rate is ridiculous.
I disagree with that philosophy. I think you use your ED on the school you love the most.
After some more reading, thanks to @gibby, the SCEA chance for an un-hooked (non-URM, non-athlete, non-legacy, non-developmental) applicant is about 7% to 9%, not 14.87%, but still much better than 3.2% at RD.
But you do realize that among those other non-hooked applicants is a published novelist, a kid whose concerto is premiering at Carnegie Hall, and various Intel/Physics Olympiad winners, right? And children of staff/graduates of local “exam” public HS’s? So the OVERALL admit rate of the non-hooked pool may be 8% but that doesn’t mean that YOUR probability of acceptance is 8%. It could be 50-60% if you’ve done something amazing; it could be 1% if you are a BWRK with high scores whose teachers think you are the best student they’ve taught in a decade.
Thank you all for enlightening me since I am a newbie here. You all are senior members of CC with over 10K posts. Some may have graduated from top schools, some may have kids who are studying at top schools. I respect your opinions greatly.
Here is the kid being discussed. Would you advise him to apply to Harvard EA with a slim chance of success? or would you advise him to apply to a less competitive school EA with a better chance of gaining acceptance? of cause assuming both schools are equally desirable to him and have the major he intends to study in.
Academics:
GPA: 3.9965/4.0 as of second semester in junior year. I am in the IB diploma program at a challenging public HS.
SAT: 2400
Awards:
a. Gold medal: 2016 Northwest Chopin Festival
b. First Prize: 2015 Crescendo Int’l Piano Competition
c. Silver medal: 2015 Northwest Chopin Festival
d. Second Prize: 2015 American Protégé Music Competition
e. Third Prize: 2015 Washington State Outstanding Artist Competition
f. Semi-finalist: 2015 Seattle Int’l Piano Competition
g. Second Prize: 2014 Crescendo Int’l Piano Competition
h. Second Prize: 2013 Seattle Bach Festival
I have performed five times at Weill recital hall at Carnegie Hall since 8th grade. I also performed at Benaroya hall in Seattle and Salle Cotort concert hall in Paris.
Extra-curriculum:
- I compose music, both orchestral and electronic. *{There was a link to a sound file here. Similar to our policy regarding other links, we do not allow links that could be to inappropriate material. - FC}*
- I run a film club at my school. We are currently shooting scenes for a feature length film I wrote about high school academic cheating club.
- I am finishing up my first novel, currently 80 pages long, I intend to publish it through amazon kindle this summer.
- I have been training in Shotokan Karate since age 5, earning my black belt at age 15. I train on average 4 hours a week. I started teaching Karate to young children after obtaining my black belt.
- I play soccer for a local area premier league club, I train 4.5 hours a week in season.
I would advise him to stop putting Harvard on a pedestal; pick the school he likes best and apply there early.
I totally agree with PG. if you want to apply early to ONE school only…make it the school that is your top choice bar none.