<p>Looking up the percent admitted on different websites, I get wildly different numbers. Of course some numbers might be from different years, but this is crazy:</p>
<p>US News 57 %
Wikipedia 83.1%
About.com 83%
***** 41%
College Data 60% or lower
Parchment 43%
College ******* 57%
College Navigator 83%</p>
<p>Can anyone speak to this?</p>
<p>If you want the real stats look at the Common Data Set. Search on Google “Common Data Set Willamette”. You will probably get links to multiple years of data and can confirm the facts there.</p>
<p>According to the college data set it’s 60.5%</p>
<p>Kind of crazy, though, no?</p>
<p>Well, you must have looked at one year. Go over the past 5 years if the CDS is out there and you will probably find a range.</p>
<p>I think there’s a pretty easy explanation for these numbers. First, I think the 83% figure was an error. I noticed that the 2012 CDS initially showed a surprisingly high admit rate. Pretty recently, the numbers on the 2012 CDS changed, showing an admit rate more in line with previous numbers. The page info shows that it was updated on May 3, 2013 11:51:02 AM.</p>
<p>Here are Willamette’s numbers since 2006. I think there’s a clear explanation for the variation, which I’ll give after the numbers.</p>
<p>Freshman Applications:</p>
<p>2006 2988 applied 2240 admitted (75%) 479 enrolled
2007 2943 applied 2301 admitted (78%) 435 enrolled
2008 4023 applied 2678 admitted (67%) 482 enrolled
2009 5739 applied 3416 admitted (60%) 541 enrolled
2010 7785 applied 3306 admitted (42%) 427 enrolled
2011 8175 applied 4685 admitted (57%) 617 enrolled
2012 8887 applied 5370 admitted (60%) 525 enrolled</p>
<p>So…57%, 63%, and 60% were all correct numbers for certain years. The 43% claimed was probably really the 42.46% in 2010. Not sure about the 41%.</p>
<p>As an explanation for the fluctuations, I’d guess that the enrollment drop in 2007 was a concern. Others have stated that Willamette wants a freshman class of around 500. 479 in 2006 didn’t cause a panic, but 435 in 2007 did. The answer was to increase Willamette’s applicant pool. I don’t know how they did this (added common app., increased advertising, added admissions reps…), but they clearly did do it. Applications were up by one third in 2008 and the incoming class grew closer to the 500 target (482). By 2009 the new strategy really paid off, as the applicant pool was nearly twice the size of 2007. That doubling (from 2943 to 5739 applicants) yielded over 100 more freshmen (541 as opposed to 435). </p>
<p>At this point, the strategy was working, but possibly too well. When applications jumped by another third (from 5739 in 2009 to 7785 in 2010), the admissions office must have feared admitting too large a class. Given that they admitted 110 fewer students in 2010 than in 2009, they probably even felt that the 541 they enrolled in 2009 were a bit too many. This concern caused a sudden drop in admission rate (from 60% in 2009 to 42 % in 2010), but the admissions office was too conservative. As application numbers increased, yield dropped (from 16% in 2009 to 13% in 2010). Enrollment fell to 427 in 2010.</p>
<p>In 2011, Willamette chose to admit an unusually large class in order to compensate for the previous year’s shortfall. The applicant pool continued to grow, but the rate of growth slowed substantially (there were only 390 more applicants than in 2010). They radically increased their admit rate to 57%, accepting 1,379 students more than they had in the previous year. This increase yielded close to 50% more enrolled students (617 in 2011 as opposed to 427 in 2010). Yield remained 13%.</p>
<p>2012 saw another significant increase in applications (up 712 from 2011). Having learned that more applications means lower yield, Willamette admitted students at a slightly higher rate than they had in the previous year (60% as opposed to 57%). As expected, yield dropped (from 13% to 10%*). The incoming class of 525 was just what they wanted.</p>
<p>*I think this drop off is surprisingly large, given that yield was stable the previous year. I do wonder if, as part of its attempt to enroll an unusually large class in 2011, the admissions office went out of its way to admit students who were more likely to enroll, or if it increased merit aid offers in order to achieve this end.</p>
<p>I think the variation in these numbers provides a good example of how admissions offices make adjustments in order to enroll the right number of students. It’s a nerve racking, high stakes game. People’s jobs are on the line, and not just those of the folks in the admissions office.</p>
<p>Willamette’s 2013 CDS is now available. [Institutional</a> Research: Common Data Sets | Willamette University](<a href=“http://www.willamette.edu/dept/ir/cds/by_year/2013/index.html]Institutional”>Institutional Research: Common Data Sets)</p>
<p>Numbers appear to be in line with previous years listed above, with 2010 as the outlier. 8109 total applicants with 4690 acceptances and 545 enrolled, for a 2013 admission rate of 57.83% and yield of 11.62%.</p>