<p>We've heard of selective LAC's like Tufts, Swat, etc. waitlisting extremely well-qualified candidates -- fearing losing them to the "Big Boys". I'm wandering over to forums such as Boston U. and Northeastern, seeing excellent candidates being <em>rejected</em> this round, not even W/L'ed. </p>
<p>Please tell me this is about yield, and not about the ratcheting up of qualifications. (If so, D's headed for community college or State.)</p>
<p>Why is it "fearing losing them to the Big Boys"? most often they will anyway, w/l or not. And a few they might end up taking.</p>
<p>Is Tufts considered an LAC?</p>
<p>Right-o, Erin's Mom. NOT an LAC. My bad. (But principle can often apply.):)</p>
<p>I'm not sure I understand your question, mini, but I needed an answer, not another question.:) (And I don't understand your attempt at an answer. Sorry)</p>
<p>There are more applicants (the babyboomer bulge), and more people with money chasing private colleges rather than state u. admissions. </p>
<p>They reject students because they are "less qualified", in terms of how the institution wants to build a class. You'll never find an admissions officer willing to admit she accepted a "less qualified" applicant in favor of a "more qualified" one.</p>
<p>About Northeastern: the school is taking advantage of the 'babyboomer bulge' to attract higher caliber candidates - they WANT to become a more selective, more prestigious school and are pumping millions of dollars to hire top faculty and build new facilities. The strategy seems to be working. The average SAT scores, percentile rank is now higher than ever at Northeastern. I know several kids who got rejected from Northeastern last year who would certainly have been admitted even five years ago.</p>
<p>Raising prices and/or winning basketball teams and/or hot locations can help. Two decades ago, Georgetown and NYU were transformed from basically mediocre institutions to star quality without any real change to their academic offerings.</p>
<p>Larger numbers of wealthy applicants who can pay full-freight can help immensely in creating prestige.</p>
<p>Epiphany -- I have to think it's about yield, not the general ratcheting up of qualifications. A month ago, I might have thought differently. But take a look at the Wash U boards to see posts from legions of kids waitlisted with what appear to be top credentials and great resumes. I know one or two such kids, and I can't for the life of me figure out why they were not admitted, other than in an effort to control yield. I know, I know, these great schools are building classes, creating mosaics. But I remain perplexed about individual decisions. There was an interesting discussion about concerns about yield affecting admissions decision in this recent thread: <a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=313416%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=313416</a></p>
<p>Rejecting topflight applicants is a surefire way to create an aura of prestige, much more effective than accepting them.</p>
<p>The schools you mentioned are on the rise as more kids want to go to medium to big-sized schools in great cities. Those schools are getting top notch female applicants because there are so many ambitious, diligent and smart female students in this generation.</p>
<p>Post #9 sounds a little more believable than #7 -- that is, taking CC postings as the reference point. (Cf. postings on the BU and NEU forums.) I'm comparing those posted stats, btw, with recent Naviance scattergrams from D's competitive private high school, where students tend to select more in line with their match schools, vs. dipping low into safety territoy. None of the recent acceptances to BU and NEU included records nearly as high as those of the "rejects" posting recently on CC.</p>
<p>I think that the Tufts Syndrome (which could be renamed the WashU syndrome this year) is partly yield, partly better applicant pools, and partly something else that is related to yield but rarely gets mentioned: </p>
<p>Application quality. Believe me, I spent the last week listening to kids (understandably, to a point) whine about being frozen out of WashU. I have serious doubts about how good all these kids' apps were--if you have great stats, but it is clear that you are mailing it in with your essays and short answers, why would a college want to accept you? Technically, this is yield concern, but I don't think that it is necessarily as sinister as some make it out to be. </p>
<p>Also, at least at my school, everybody and their brother applied to WashU. That right there could have been trouble for many of the kids--they were being compared to the top kids from our school. Yes, yes, before I get yelled at, I know that technically kids from the same HS are not compared to each other. I just think that there is a saturation effect--even at the elite private high schools, not everyone can get into Harvard. Same idea here, in my opinion.</p>
<p>wash u has had the rep of wait listing tons of kids for a few years now</p>
<p>While I agree that from a student perspective this trend is scary and confusing, it doesn't surprise me in the least. I've been reading newspaper articles about this bulge in the population for years, articles that typically do discuss the effect on college admissions. </p>
<p>Yes, very qualified students are being denied or waitlisted. But I'm not seeing that unqualified kids are getting in -- look at the statistics for any of these schools, and you'll probably see an increase in average SAT scores. </p>
<p>You mention Tufts -- its mean SAT score for admitted students last year was 715CR and 718M. Three years ago its 25-75% SAT range was 1250-1420; last year it was 1300-1520! Its acceptance rate dropped from 33% to 26.6% over that time, and I'll bet was even lower this year. It's seen a very large increase in applicants (I vaguely remember something like 40% from 5 years ago), so it and other schools like it can afford to be picky. (Northwestern had a 19 percent increase in applicants this year alone!) Highly qualified kids have been denied at HYPS etc. for years -- now other schools can do the same thing given the number of applications.</p>
<p>Perhaps there is some yield manipulation happening, but reports lately are that very few kids are being taken off the waiting list and that classes are oversubscribed in some places (Brandeis, for example). And why not accept kids who want to go to the school? That makes for a happier student body. They may be denying highly qualified kids, but they are accepting highly qualified ones too.</p>
<p>It's depressing, it's scary, but the handwriting has been on the wall for years.</p>
<p>"Yes, very qualified students are being denied or waitlisted."</p>
<p>They are, by definition, LESS qualified, or they would have been accepted.</p>
<p>"Please tell me this is about yield, and not about the ratcheting up of qualifications. (If so, D's headed for community college or State.)"</p>
<p>The nursing program at North Shore Community College ion Beverly is significantly more selective than Tufts, Northeastern, or BU.</p>
<p>....So I guess the cautious types would want to just throw in the towel & apply ED with high stats: A Win/Win/Win for the college: less financial aid negotiation concerns, guaranteed yield, raising of student body quality. Less of a win for the applicant: gets only location of choice and "an" acceptance.</p>
<p>Lose/lose for the applicant who is actually a match for the school & would thrive, but cannot afford the ED & is competing with those 3.9's, 4.1's, etc.</p>
<p>Advantagious, I didn't understand your point exactly about the quality of the apps, which it seems you were trying to explain thus, "if you have great stats, but it is clear that you are mailing it in with your essays and short answers, why would a college want to accept you?"</p>
<p>?</p>
<p>Well gee, thanks, but she's not interested in nursing & would make one lousy nurse.</p>
<p>Good thing, because her odds at Harvard are about the same (and, unlike H., they could care less about your ECs or your field hockey skills.)</p>
<p>I think too many people still make the mistake of confusing high stats with "qualifications." Colleges ARE concerned about yield -- they have to be -- but they don't select or reject students merely on their numbers. They are looking for qualitative factors that indicate likelihood of attendance -- and I think that the mistake that is often made by high stat applicants is something like this:</p>
<p>Their SATs put them clearly in the upper range for a college like Wash U or Tufts, so they decide to use those schools as a "safety" while they apply to their top choice, HYP. Having categorized Wash U/Tufts as "safety" in their minds, they send off a safety-top application. Meanwhile, Wash U/Tufts are also getting applicants who see them as their top choice, dream school -- who may very well have somewhat lower scores -- and on average there is probably a qualitative difference in their interactions with the school and the type of things they write on their applications... with the answer to the question "why do you want to attend our college" being particularly telling. </p>
<p>So to the stat-obsessed, it seems like a game is being played. To the ad com, it may be a matter of honing in on applicants who do seem more likely to attend -- which can overlap with the "safety" concern, but may be include other factors as well.</p>