Category: Ivy League Admissions

More Ivy League Schools Drop SAT/ACT Requirement; Princeton Drops Early Admissions

More Ivy League Schools Drop SAT/ACT Requirement; Princeton Drops Early Admissions

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Big Changes Are Happening In College Admissions

I will be updating this post periodically as many universities are making midstream changes to their application process even as application materials for the Covid year are starting to appear–like the Cornell application essays, which are up now and ready to write for this fall’s applications. Big changes have already occurred in Ivy League admissions, and more seem to be on the way.

How to Think About Optional SAT/ACT Tests

At this point, the ACT/SAT tests are optional for fall 2020 applicants to Ivy League universities. However, if you have good scores you should absolutely send them, because the bottom line is that a good number will help you get admitted. And while the language used by the schools shows that they will be looking more intensely at other parts of your record and essays to determine your academic merit, that means they have to come up with a qualitative way to match a non-test applicant against an applicant with a quantitative test score.

By default, I still have to say that gives an initial advantage to a person with a great SAT score, going head to head with a person who does not have a great SAT score. But if you have a good set of classes on your transcript and good extracurriculars, you can still compete without that test number–but it means that you need to create a winning picture on the written side of your application, in your activities descriptions and in your essays. Think great essays rather than simply good essays.

Here’s the latest update on changes in Ivy League application requirements for 2020-2021

Princeton Admissions Changes for 2020-2021

Princeton has made the biggest move in admissions among Ivy League schools as of the third week of June.

Among their changes are the expected–Princeton has announced that SAT/ACT tests are optional, which was not a big surprise–and the unexpected: Old Nassau is also dropping its early admissions option. Why?

The answer is pretty simple–it takes pressure off of both sides of the application process: high school seniors trying to juggle hybrid/online school with college admissions now have more time to deal with their application, and Princeton’s admissions people have time to organize how they will process applications while keeping their admissions people safe during the Covid pandemic.

That, and the Ivy League schools are in a slow dance, adjusting their application policies to each other–look directly below to see how universities that currently offer an early application option are beginning to hedge.

So as with the dropping of the SAT test requirement, expect more Ivies to follow Princeton’s lead by moving to a single, regular application date. This is not just herd behavior–it’s about impacts to applications: if only one school ends up keeping a particular kind of admissions policy, e.g. early action admissions, well . . . let’s just say that school will have many early admissions applications to deal with. Princeton was slow to suspend the tests for this year’s application, but now they’ve upped the ante by dropping early applications entirely for this year. That’s why I expect some of those who currently confirm at least EA apps to drop the early application in the coming weeks. I will update this post when they do.

Here is the language from Princeton:

The University will move to one application deadline of Jan. 1, 2021 for this first-year admission cycle. All applicants will apply using either the Coalition Application or Common Application through the Regular Decision process and will receive decisions on their applications by April 1, 2021. Princeton will continue to partner with QuestBridge and participate in the National College Match in December.

Harvard Admissions Changes

Speaking of schools hedging their early application language: Harvard has dropped the test requirement, and they continue to offer Early Action, but I believe they are moving toward dropping it, so be prepared. Here’s the language:

Our early action deadline remains November 1 for now. If students wish to submit standardized tests, the November tests will arrive in time for early action consideration. Because of COVID-19, we expect that fewer students will apply early this year and students should not rush to apply early if they feel they are not ready. As always, there is no advantage to applying early versus regular. (note that the bold font was added by me, for emphasis).

My main comment on that last bit, about no advantage for early application: Hahaha.

On average, the admit data shows that an early application at least doubles the rate of admissions over a regular application. Some of this has to do with the larger pool in regular admissions, but the evidence still favors early applications. Among other things, you really show that demonstrated interest by using up your early app opportunity on a school–that confirms a higher level of commitment. To see what I mean about the data, have a look at my comparison of early vs. regular admissions for last year’s application cycle: Ivy League Application Data

Yale Admissions Changes

Yale, too has dropped its SAT/ACT requirement, and has similar language to the others about not advantaging students who can supply scores. As with the other schools, I am sure they will try to read your information to accomodate the lack of test data, but I add this consideration in my comments on Yale–and this applies to all of the other Ivy League universities: when you have tens of thousands of applicants, and out of that, let’s say ten thousand of them have close to perfect GPA and great transcripts, how do you decide whom to admit? Clearly, test scores are an advantage, just because they are easy to compare.

However, do not despair; creating an exceptionally strong written side of your application will help.

Speaking of which: Yale’s application essay and supplemental writing for this year are up; I will write a post on their supplemental writing pretty soon, but in the meantime, here is the link to the prompts for 2020-2021: Yale Application Essays and Supplemental Writing.

Brown University Admissions Changes

So far Brown is keeping their early admissions, but they, too, are test-optional. Here is a key quote that adds something to consider for all of the Ivy League applications you might do:

We want to see what you have accomplished with the resources and opportunities available to you in high school, as well as evaluate your potential to thrive within the unique offerings of Brown University.

I would advise that this look at what you did with the resources and opportunitiies available to you in high school is key to all Ivy League applications this year, as they are all adjusting to the new environment, but I would add that a close reader sees that phrase “evaluate your potential to thrive . . . at Brown. They can look at how well you”thrived” in the last semester of your junior year, and over this summer, to see whether you took the initiative to get some activities going on your own, or by organizing with others, particularly in an ad hoc fashion. I mean, did you stay home and applaud protesters for peace and justice, or did you show to march or to supply water bottles or get involved in some other way? ‘Nuff said.

Cornell University Application Changes

Same story–no test requirement for 2020-2021. They are keeping their Early Decision in place, and of the Ivies, they will be among the last to drop that–if they do. They admit a large percentage under E.D. and it’s a big part of their admissions philosophy, as they seek the truly committed.

As noted in my intro to this post, they also have their supplement up and ready to go. If you did not check my analysis on that, see it here: Cornell Supplement Class of 2025.

Columbia Application Changes for 2020-2021

Columbia has also adopted a test-optional policy for this year only.

No new language has been adopted for their Early Decision applications, with the November 1 E.D. deadline still in place.

University of Pennsylvania Application Changes for 2020-2021

Same-same: SAT/ACT are optional for UPenn this year. Early Decision is still in place, and I would expect Penn to resist dropping it. E.D. is a different animal than E.A. in a number of ways. For E.D. schools, early applications play a more important, and fixed, part of the application process.

Dartmouth Application Changes for 2020-2021

And of course, Dartmouth is also test-optional in 2020-2021. Have a look at Dean Coffin’s blog–scroll down from the header photo and bio of the Dean to see his explanation and his view of the tests and the application evaluation process: Dean Coffin’s blog.

(No doubt the Dean’s surname name will inspire jokes about Dartmouth being the place that applications go to die, but of course that is actually Stanford (sub-5% admit rate, folks). The Dean seems like a pretty great guy, actually).

Applying to College in 2019-2020: An Early Look at Early Application Data

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Greetings Rising Seniors and anybody else who wants to look at which colleges are a “fit” for them.

While this post is going to take a look at some early application results for this year, first let me digress for a paragraph: the “fit” of a college–how well it matches your needs and qualifications– is a bit more like the fit of a pair of good jeans than it is s simple statistical match. The ratings you see in various services like the U.S. News don’t tell you anything about how you will feel at a particular school. Location, including weather, culture and activities are also part of the package of things to consider, along with the usual suspects, like the size of the campus, class sizes and strength of programs.

But this is still early days, and I have talked about fit elsewhere (and will again, soon), so let’s move on to some data on the more popular names–though it’s never early to try to think outside the box, as I will show.

Early Admissions for Fall of 2019 (Class of 2023):

Princeton

13.9 % admitted (743 accepted out of 5,335 applicants, and you can assume that over 80% of those will accept and attend).

Harvard:

13.4% admitted. (935 accepted out of 6,598-and again, the yield–those who accept the admissions offer–will be in the 80% range)

Yale

13.1% admiited (794 accepted out of 6,016 early action applicants. This will also be a very high yield group, and Jeremiah Quinlan, the current Dean of Undergrad Admissions stated the 56% of those not accepted were deferred and will be reconsidered for admissions)

Columbia

Has not released results. They are the most chary in providing data among the Ivy League (that New Yawk attitude, I guess) but they did say that 4,461 students applied for binding Early Decision. They won’t tell you anything about their admit rate for ED, but I do want to point out that this means hundreds more early applicants this year over last. And now let’s jump to my go-to application for the Ivies, Cornell–great offerings across the board in terms of majors and quality of programs, and still the easiest Ivy to get into:

Cornell

22.6% accepted in Cornell’s Early Decision applications (1,395 admits out of 6,159 apps . . . Among other things to note, Cornell was overt in its appeal to legacy applicants, indicating that they should show their seriousness by doing an early decision app [and then pay whatever tuition package Cornell offers, as you give up your chance to wait to see what other offers might come when you apply E.D. . . Just remindin’] ).

Your Takeway

I realize that this is far from a complete review of Ivy League early app data, but it is enough to “do the math.” And the math says that you can double to nearly triple your chances with an early application of whatever kind, on a raw statistical basis.

How do I know this? From last year’s data. Look below for a more complete picture of early versus regular decision last year (meaning people who were incoming freshman last August). The reality, however, is that the raw numbers don’t say a lot about any individual’s chances of admission, and there are important “other” factors, such as . . . well that legacy leverage, indicated above in that comment from Cornell. Yes, a legacy applicant who applies early will get a boost, it’s official. Please note, Dear Reader, that I am not commenting on that in any way; I am just stating the facts, which is the only purpose of this post. I have written about this before, however, and will write about this again . . . but for now, look below and you will find last year’s early and regular application data–then do the math as you start thinking about where to apply, and where to apply early

Last year’s data (Class of 2022):

Some Ivy League examples and Stanford in 2018:

Princeton:  Early Admissions–15.4%; Regular Admissions–5.5% (6.1% last year [2017] )

Harvard:  Early Admissions–14.539%; Regular Admissions–4.59% (5.2% last year [2017] )

Yale:  Early Admissions–14.68%; Regular Admissions–6.3% (6.9% last year [2017] )

Columbia–5.5% admit rate; no data supplied for early admissions admit rate. (At least some things are consistent . . . )

UPenn–Early Admissions–18.5%; Regular Admissions–8.39% (9.15% last year)

Brown: Early Admissions–21.7%*; Regular Admissions–7.2%

Cornell:  Early Admissions–24.3%; Regular Admissions–10.3%

Dartmouth–Early Admissions–24.9%; Regular Admissions–8.7%

Saving the toughest nut for last:

Stanford;  Regular Admissions–4.3%; Stanford has not released early application information, or not released it until the following year, for some time, but about 33% of the new class was admitted early. (Again, this is last year’s data. I will update on Stanford soon, but they are becoming the Columbia of the West Coast in terms of data stinginess . . . so much for information wanting to be free.

*Oh, and The Brown early admissions asterisk for fall of 2018 entry data (class of 2022) was due to this data being released indirectly via a presentation, rather than through a press release. I updated it separately, for my clients. This is a free blog site so . . . not everything gets posted here, but I do hope you find it useful, Oh Free Public User).

Ivy League and Stanford Application Data A Look Backward to See How to Triple Your Chances for Admission in 2020

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Actually, you can more than triple your chances, on a purely mathematical basis. 

But First:  Who should read this post–Anybody interested in applying to the Ivy League or to Stanford this year. 

How to read this post:  Below you will find a (long) preface that gives some context to  the data and offers and analogy for applying to the most competitive colleges–things are not necessarily what they seem.  After that is a comparison of early and regular app results for some of the Ivies and Stanford. If you hate prefaces and prefer to avoid context, then just scroll on down to the numbers. But I think you would be well advised to consider what I say in the preface before going on to the data.

Preface:  Welcome to the Casino

Most people look at college admissions data as a probabilities thing.

This is not really a good way to look at the averages offered in the various data sets, because the average applies only to any group within a data set but not necessarily to any specific person in that group–Yes, I know that this is true of any average, but the idea that somehow there is a typical college applicant makes this even more problematic. Just try to quantify the “average” set of college essays, for example– a college application is highly specific to you–or it should be.  And you are not just sitting there while somebody pulls numbers out of a hat–you are put in one of a series of hats based on data and other information, up front.

Added to that, the colleges adjust what they are looking for year-to-year and even within the same application cycle as they go.

And now add to that the fact that, with few exceptions, your application will be evaluated by a general purpose reader or committee of application officers, not by professors or people running specific majors and programs (a direct application to the U Michigan Business school would be one example of an exception to this rule, as are pretty much all graduate applications. Our focus here is on undergrads).  Your app readers will be rating your stuff against your peers, and there is a sliding scale:  Factors that are not known to you will shape the value of the elements of your application, on the margins for the most part, but this is a game of margins.  This is less true but still applies to some extent to so-called objective application schools, like the Cal State system, which “only” look at data–I have discussed this at length multiple times elsewhere.

Of course, there are probabilities to be found in the data–if you have a 3.68 unweighted G.P.A.  and are a nice person with wide interests but are not developing your grand theory to unit the physical laws of the universe and are not a heavily recruited athlete or prodigy cello player, you are not going to get into Harvard.  Period.

Other than that, the data on the most competitive schools can only tell if you have a seat at the table, not what your results will be, and  and let’s face it:  when it comes to the Ivy League and Stanford, for most of the best students, the game is more like rolling dice at a craps table than it is like playing Blackjack.

Let me explain by developing my casino analogy further:  if you are playing a card game like Blackjack,  you have a pretty decent idea of what your cards mean.  21, for example, and you probably win.  The cards are what they are, and their specific values never change.  Not so in college admissions, where perfect data may be trumped by other factors.

A college admissions portfolio, with its data, its essays, its activities and descriptions, its personal and family history, is not some set of cards randomly dealt out to you, and the payoff does not come by simply having a  an ace and a ten.  It’s true that having an unweighted 4.0 G.P.A. and perfect SAT score should get you some kind of Ivy admit, and hopefully more than one, but it’s also possible that if you took perfect numbers and applied to, say, Yale, Harvard, Princeton and Columbia, that you would bust–get no admissions at all.  Yet if you get that ace and a ten in Blackjack, you have 21 and you win.

In college admissions, each of the top universities not only turn down hundreds of students with the equivalent of 21, they also accept quite a few students who have something like an 18, because there is something in the information that suggest some other value to the university.  In the case of that athlete who will looks very promising, maybe a hand of 16 is good enough. Again, I have discussed this elsewhere, but in just keeping alumni involved and happy, sports is big money to many colleges, and the return on investment an athlete can be huge–as it can for a prodigy who goes on to wealth and fame and returns some of that to a school.

What colleges are looking for–the relative value of any information in your application, the cards you bring to the table, changes not just year to year, but week to week during the application process.  Usually these changes are marginal, but if a school sees that their admitted students have been 70% female in the early applications, they will make an adjustment to get some kind of gender balance–not 50/50, but not 70/30 either.  For a coed school, that would not be a healthy balance.  So they stack the deck–in a way that, on average, is actually more fair than it might seem.

Colleges for the most part look to have some kind of balance in the community of scholars that they build with each application year.  Continuing our casino analogy for the most elite schools, the players sitting at the Blackjack table of college admissions are not coming with the same advantages, and many people build up their cards through paying for services and having access to good schools, while others just get the cards dealt to them and start with a relatively weak hand on any deal they take.

A good college app reader can see that, and they evaluate with a range of factors in mind, including the resilience and drive of a person who overcame a lot to get to that application.

Continuing my analogy, the casino owners, in this case the colleges and their admissions officers, change the value of the hand of a person who is a first-generation high-achiever as opposed to that of a high-achiever going to a good high school on the Peninsula in the Bay Area or in the Tri-Valley area (sorry to be a regionalist here, but the same applies to, say, kids in Princeton-area schools vs. Newark, etc).  This is not always a factor, but it often is.

But of the people I helped this year who got into Harvard, all had solid upper and middle-class backgrounds along with a range of accomplishments, some of which were clearly part of playing the game.  On the other hand, two years ago, I had a number who were first-gen to college and came from relatively poor backgrounds and borderline schools.  I see a lot of flux in my own clients every year, which is why you always want to tier your apps and be a bit zen about it, if you can.

This seems unfair and frustrating to many people when I explain it, but I don’t think it is, or it is at least more fair than it seems.  What is unfair is the fact that this country has by and large stopped building new universities, thus creating an inelastic supply (Econ!) and making my casino analogy apt.  And in this increasingly hyper-competitive college application game, social factors already rig college admissions long before any college application reader gets involved.  What kind of money your family has and where they are from generally  determines what kind of high school you go to and what kind of resources are available to you outside of school.  This is why housing values are so high in suburbs with good schools.

There are, of course, reasons that being in one of these excellent school districts is a huge advantage, and being able to pay your way can help at times, as well, so don’t be sorry if you are in one of these places.  But plan well, following some of the tips I offer in various posts in my blog.  Even if you have a 4.0. and perfect S.A. T.

And  if your data is on the low end of the range, you need to have something special for that doorman or bouncer or whatever image you prefer to open the door for you so you can even get a seat at the table.  If you are a rising senior, that means it’s time to start considering your essays as well as possibly retaking an SAT or ACT.

Okay, sermon over.

But please keep these things in mind when you look at the data I provide below, and build a list of colleges in which you include at least three schools in which 75% or more of the people with your data are admitted.

And let’s take a historical look; first, click this link to see the data for the class entering this August and September (Fall of 2019):

Early Admissions for the future class of 2023

Then take a look at data from the year before, below, to compare trends

Admissions Data for the Future Class of 2022

Princeton:  Early Admissions–15.4%; Regular Admissions–5.5% (6.1% last year)

Harvard:  Early Admissions–14.539%; Regular Admissions–4.59% (5.2% last year)

Yale:  Early Admissions–14.68%; Regular Admissions–6.3% (6.9% last year)

Columbia–5.5% admit rate; not data supplied for early admissions admit rate.

UPenn–Early Admissions–18.5%; Regular Admissions–8.39% (9.15% last year)

Brown: Early Admissions–21.7%*; Regular Admissions–7.2%

Cornell:  Early Admissions–24.3%; Regular Admissions–10.3%

Dartmouth–Early Admissions–24.9%; Regular Admissions–8.7%

Saving the toughest nut for last:

Stanford;  Regular Admissions–4.3%; Stanford has not released early application information, or not released it until the following year, for some time, but about 33% of the new class was admitted early.

*Oh, and The Brown early admissions asterisk is due to this data being released indirectly via a presentation, rather than through a press release.

On the face of it, it looks like you can triple your chances of admissions by applying early.  But look again at some more information–After you adjust for students already admitted in the early round, the actual admissions rate for regular-decision applications was 2.43%.  Ouch.

So if two things are true, burn an early app on one of these schools:

  1.  You know the school well and are totally committed to it. Even it they will let you look around after an early app admit, like Stanford, be committed.
  2.  Your data is in the range that suggests success (middle third or higher)

And hopefully you have a wide range of activities and can write some good essays.  I do have space for some new clients for editing, if you need help, so contact me if so:

College Application and Essay Editing Help

It it’s your turn to make a run at college this year, try to enjoy the ride, and come back soon.  I will be looking at some alternatives to the most competitive schools, starting with the unorthodox and moving to the more common.  See you soon.

Now That You Have Your College Acceptances: Last Minute Advice for Which College to Choose

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And my advice is:  follow the money.  Or at least consider if going to, say, Cornell, is going to offer enough bang for your bucks.  Paradoxically, there is evidence that, if you are a “First-Gen” college student, or your family has limited financial means, the extra money is more likely to pay off in the kind of social capital that upper-middle class and wealthy students take for granted.  I will link some evidence for my claims below.  For now I am just going to outline some basic truths, both in general and from my own experience:

  1.  Selecting a college these days is a lot like buying a house.  Money should be as important as the amenities and location in choosing a college, just as it is when buying a house.  And like buying a house has the basic function of providing shelter, so the purpose of college is to provide you an education.  Connections are great and all, and I will get to those later, as promised, but don’t get blinded by the future promise of the connections you think you will make, or by the present promise of a really cool gym and dorm room, or all that tradition and ivy-covered walls.  When I have worked with groups of students who ended up going to different colleges, they have come back to me and confirmed that the basic product–a good education–is remarkably similar, campus-by-campus.  Continuing my house analogy, I just looked up foreclosures in the wealthy enclave of Alamo, CA, and opened up a house going into foreclosure that has 8,000 square feet and seven bathrooms.  The ego benefit of having a Harvard sticker may not outweigh paying five hundred bucks a month for student loans for seven or ten years, or handing on debt to your children, just as the ego benefit of having 8k square feet with a view from the side of Mount Diablo is meaningless when you cannot pay for it, or are trapped by the payments.  Keep in mind that financial aid packages can be adjusted upward or downward every year.  Don’t get buyers remorse next year, or the year you graduate and get your first loan payment letter.
  2. The most important thing about a college education is not the name of the school.  It is the degree itself.  I know this sounds like what I just argued, but bear with me for the details.  The social connections made at an elite college provide a boost that is notable mostly for low-income and First Gen students.  Most solidly middle class (and up) students already have connections; for them, brand name and social considerations should not be at the top of the list, if money will be a problem.  But studies show that the degree is the main thing–if you have 100,00 dollars in debt after going to an elite school, versus say 20k after going to a state school, you are not likely to see enough of a difference in income to make that a good payoff.  To repeat, with feeling:  Getting a degree is the most important thing, not which college it is from, in terms of incomes after college, and  doubly not so for any technical major (engineering, et al) or finance or business . . . The takeaway is put the degree itself and the cost at the top of your considerations. If you are from a family that will not get good financial aid, and tuition, et al,  will be hard to carry–especially if private student loans are going to be needed–and you have other options, I suggest really considering those cheaper options.  Also note how long the latest financial expansion is and plan on a recession starting anywhere from next month to, at the latest, your junior year in college.  Still feeling good about the financials?
  3. If you want to  major in something like Art History or English, but feel you cannot because of cost, you should look for a cheaper school.  If you do well in any major, and plug in the right minor that gives you some skills, you can get a good job.  A recent client, for example, majored in lit, with a Comp Sci minor and is not doing animation and web design, with all kinds of things opening up for him.
  4. You should ignore people like Peter Thiel, who claim college is somehow not necessary, and go, if you can.  Notice that Thiel has not one, but two Stanford degrees.  But I do agree with Thiel on one thing:  too many people are leveraging and taking on debt to go to college.  So go to a community college with a clear university target to follow, if money is an issue.  And make that university a public, in-state school for the best bang for your buck.

And now, here is some evidence for my claims:

From the Brookings Institute, the positive impact of college on earnings for students from backgrounds of poverty:

As the figure shows, however, without a college degree a child born into a family in the lowest quintile has a 45 percent chance of remaining in that quintile as an adult and only a 5 percent chance of moving into the highest quintile. On the other hand, children born into the lowest quintile who do earn a college degree have only a 16 percent chance of remaining in the lowest quintile and a 19 percent chance of breaking into the top quintile. In other words, a low-income individual without a college degree will very likely remain in the lower part of the earnings distribution, whereas a low-income individual with a college degree could just as easily land in any income quintile—including the highest.

Also from Brookings, the effect of a college degree, categorically, without reference to college pedigree:

For more on that Brookings study, which shows that the poor still don’t get as good a deal as the rich (but still:  get the degree):  Brookings.

And more evidence on the effect of college on earnings:

So what role do U.S. colleges play in promoting upward mobility? According to the authors, their analysis of the data yielded four main findings.

First, access to colleges varies greatly by parent income. For example, children whose parents are in the top one percent of the income distribution are seventy-seven times more likely to attend an Ivy League college than those whose parents are in the bottom income quintile. Contrary to public perception, colleges in America are just as socioeconomically segregated as the neighborhoods where children grow up.

Second, within a given college, children from low- and high-income families end up earning very similar amounts. In other words, colleges are successfully “leveling the playing field” for the students they admit, and poor students don’t appear to be “overmatched” at selective colleges as some observers have suggested. On average—and regardless of socioeconomic background—the subsequent earnings of students who attend “elite” schools put them in roughly the eightieth income percentile versus the seventieth percentile for students at other four-year colleges and the sixtieth percentile for students at two-year colleges.

Third, upward mobility rates vary substantially across colleges. For example, California State University–Los Angeles catapults a whopping 10 percent of its student body from the bottom quintile to the top, and some campuses of the City University of New York (CUNY) and the University of Texas system have mobility rates above 6 percent. Yet one in ten colleges has a mobility rate of less than 1 percent. (More on these variations below.)

Finally, although the fraction of low income kids attending college increased from 38 to 46 percent during the 2000s, the number attending colleges with high mobility rates fell sharply, while the fraction of low-income students at four-year colleges and selective schools was unchanged—even at Ivy League colleges, which enacted substantial tuition reductions and other outreach policies. Most of the increase in low-income enrollment occurred at two-year colleges and for-profit institutions.

 

For more on that last study, go here:  College Effect on Upward Mobility

 

Comparative Ivy League (And Other) Admissions Statistics For This Year And Beyond

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In my last post, I took a look at trends in admissions–finding, most notably, that admission rates at the most competitive schools are continuing to trend downward in the single digits.  This post will give three year results for all of the Ivy League universities, below, as well as results on other universities that were popular with my clients this year.  (This data changes from early in the year until late spring; I update as I get new numbers but not necessarily immediately.)  Some schools are holding steady, others are seeing decreasing rates of admissions, while  a few saw a slight increase in admits.

I also made some suggestions in the last post about looking outside the usual suspects, i.e, the 12 or so big names that always come up when constructing a college list, something I have been discussing for years.  I will repost and link the relevant posts  in the coming days and weeks.

In addition to broadening your college search and making a longer target list, the supplementary work that you do in applying to college this year will  be even more important for the selective schools.  Essays are always the center of this effort, which is why I spend so much time addressing them in by blog posts, and essay development and editing is central to my business and my work with applicants.  My first recommendation on essays is to get started now.

It’s true that most new prompts will not be up until July or later, but this is a good time to find a small notebook and carry it around so you can jot down ideas when they come to you–I am serious about this; you will need a bit of focus for your thoughts, so have a look at my post on this year’s Common Application Prompts, then get that notebook, carry it with you, and take the time to scribble an idea down when it comes to you.  You will find that good ideas can fade and be lost as quickly as you forget your dreams–if you don’t write them down.  A notebook is best for this because it is really good only for making notes, and so tends to work better for this task than does that most distracting platform called a smart phone.

Check the admissions trends below;   but for a comparison, before you do check our trends in the U. S., here is the most recent data from the University of Edinburgh:

University of Edinburgh

2012-2013 Total Number of Applications: 47,076; 18,155 offers; 5,457 accepted; Offer rate 38.6%.  The offer rate does vary by “programme”.

Note that a single applicant can make multiple applications to the university, to different programs, so the acceptance rate is a bit exaggerated–but still . . . compare this to the Ivy League three-year returns, below:

Three Year Admissions Results, Ivy League (these numbers represent the total percent of applicants who were offered admission)

Brown–2011: 8.70%; 2012: 9.60%; 2013: 9.16%

Columbia– 2011: 6.93%; 2012: 7.42%; 2013:  6.89%

Cornell–2011: 17.95; 2012: 16.2%; 2013: 15.15%

Dartmouth–2011: 10.14%; 2012: 9.79; 2013: 10.05

Harvard– 2011: 6.17%; 2012: 5.92%; 2013: 5.79%

Princeton–2011: 8.39%; 2012:  7.86%; 2013: 7.29%

U Penn–2011:  12.26%; 2012: 12.32; 2013:10.05

Yale–2011: 7.35%; 2012: 6.81%; 2013: 6.72%

Three Year Results, Other Universities

Cal Tech–2011: 12.99; 2012: 11.76; 2013: 10.55%

M. I. T. —2011: 10.07%; 2012: 8.9%; 2013: 10.2% (pending final number)

Georgetown–2011:  16.8%; 2012: 16.5%; 2013: 16.6%

Northwestern– 2011: 18.03%;  2012: 15.27%; 2013: 13.90%

Stanford–2011:  7.10%; 2012: 6.61%; 2013: 5.69%

U. C. Berkeley–2011:  25.54%; 2012: 21.13%; 2013: 20.83%

U. C. L. A.–2011:  25.28%; 2012: 21.27%; 2013: 21.10

University of Chicago–2011: 16.29%; 2012: 13.24%; 2013: 8.81%

As I said in the last post, apply to the university of your dreams, even if your stats make an admit unlikely, but then look around for more fallback and sure thing choices.  And start thinking of yourself as an internationalist as well.  There are many fine anglophone schools, abroad, and not just in Canada.  The University of Edinburgh, for example . . .

Early College Admissions Statistics For 2013-2014: What It Means For You

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College admissions results this year show that competition for spots at selective and super selective universities is, once again,  increasing.   With yet again a lower ratio of admits to applications at most of the selective schools,  it’s a good time to broaden your list of college application options.

To be more specific, I have traditionally advised that qualified students apply to 8-10 carefully selected schools, using a list that includes a calculated mix, from “reach” schools to  sure thing schools.  If you are applying in 2013-2014,   I think you are going to need  a longer list, something more like 12-15 schools, including some out-of-state and at least a couple of international schools–particularly if your short list includes the highly selective schools.  Even if looking outside the U.S.  sounds unappealing now, you may change your mind–and if you don’t prepare, you won’t apply (and if you don’t apply, that door won’t be there to open if you do change your mind later).

Before I get to specific results on some of the most competitive schools, here’s the gist:  the top 10-15% of the high school class across the country are applying to the most selective colleges.  Some students below this cohort do apply and get in, but usually because they are in some sense an exception, whether through athletic or other talents.  When we shift to the super selective colleges (top-tier Ivy League, Stanford, et al), the top 10% of students are applying, and of that top 10%, less than 10% are accepted.  In other words, getting a seat at the most competitive schools has become a bloodbath primarily between the top 1% of all students in the country.  Hyperbolic?  Well, no real blood is shed, but even accounting for the gamesmanship among universities as they try to increase the appearance of selectivity, the trends are sobering.  Here’s some specifics:

Columbia’s overall admit rate for 2013 was 7.42%; Princeton came in at a 7.29% overall admit rate; Yale reported 6.72%; Harvard 5.79% and Stanford, 5.69%.  Looking at another good, public option, in the University of California system, Berkeley accepted 20.83% and UCLA 20.10%,  still pretty selective numbers, but compared to the top Ivies and Stanford, almost comforting.  Almost.

Ouch.  But in addition to checking out this year’s results, you also should be looking at the trends.  Here is a three-year sample of results, at a wider selection of the selective schools:

Overall Admissions Rates by Year

Columbia– 2011: 6.93%; 2012: 7.42%; 2013:  6.89%

Harvard– 2011: 6.17%; 2012: 5.92%; 2013: 5.79%

Northwestern– 2011: 18.03%;  2012: 15.27%; 2013: 13.90%

Princeton–2011: 8.39%; 2012:  7.86%; 2013: 7.29%

Stanford–2011:  7.10%; 2012: 6.61%; 2013: 5.69%

University of Chicago–2011: 16.29%; 2012: 13.24%; 2013: 8.81%

U. C. Berkeley–2011:  25.54%; 2012: 21.13%; 2013: 20.83%

U. C. L. A.–2011:  25.28%; 2012: 21.27%; 2013: 21.10

Yale–2011: 7.35%; 2012: 6.81%; 2013: 6.72%

Yep, Stanford is looking like a good bet to drop below the 5% admit rate first, and will do so next year or the year after, given the trend, with Harvard right behind them.  (All those tech start-up wannabes, perhaps.)

What to do in response to these daunting stats?

My preliminary response is:  By all means, apply to your dream school(s),  even if some of them seem improbable; just be sure, as I suggested earlier, that you widen your net and look outside your early list, in particular adding some of those  international options, like the University of British Columbia, McGill,  et al.  There are hundreds of thousands of students around the world having a great experience and getting their money’s worth at non-brand name universities.

Of course you should always compare your own stats to those of the schools you are looking at to get an idea of what’s a reach and what seems a sure bet as you make a balanced list of schools.  But just as important as stats in making a good list of schools is a clear understanding of your own needs and motivations, your goals and what you will need to reach them.  Reassess yourself, particularly why you want to attend any of the more selective schools.  Then reassess the schools themselves, particularly by looking at the programs you are interested in–note that the specific programs or majors should be the main reason you want to attend school x or  school y.

I will, in future posts, be unpacking all of these aspects of the college search in more detail, for they are each becoming more  complex every year.  In just one example of what I mean, I find it harder and harder to offer specific advice about the job market of the future to my clients.   Things are changing fast as everything from outsourcing to automated and robotic systems  impact the traditional white collar professions.  You might want to think about these things as you consider possible majors.

Algorithms aren’t just driving experimental automobiles–they are sorting and analyzing more and more information in areas that once required  highly intelligent–and college-trained–humans.  It won’t just be taxi drivers and truck drivers who will wonder what happened to their professions in ten or twenty years.  From the grunt work of legal searches to patient assessment to you name it, the jobs of middle class and upper middle class professionals are also entering a period of enormous change, and not just from automation.  Plenty of highly skilled, English-speaking people overseas can process and analyze the files and data that are the jobs of many people here today.

These and other trends are clear, and choosing a specific profession these days is starting to seem like picking stocks, with fewer and fewer sure-bet blue chips available.  So I encourage you to think more in terms of developing a knowledge base and some skill sets as you consider programs and schools.

In terms of selecting  specific schools, one thing I can say with certainty is that too many of the college applicants that I have been dealing with in recent years are buying too much into  marketing and imagery.   Many feel that only by  going to school x or y  will  they get the special training and connections they need to succeed.   Sure, Harvard, Yale, Stanford have great programs, and there are networking advantages that arise in some programs in these schools, but for every Zuckerberg, there are 10,000 others struggling to pay down student loans while also holding down a couple of jobs–they would have had a lot less to pay off if they had gone to a cheaper school with less marquee appeal. (I’ll be discussing expenses in a later post.  Other discussions, such as the overblown college is a waste of time for young genius entrepreneurs  meme can wait for much later).

There are, of course, a variety of strategies you can consider once you’ve done that thorough self assessment.

But first, here’s a few other stats to consider–let’s start with the University of British Columbia, generally considered the #2 university in Canada and ranked #30 in the world by the Times World University Rankings.  UBC has an average GPA of about 3.6 on recent admits and about half of domestic applicants were admitted;  McGill, the top university in Canada, had an average GPA in the same range– I hasten to add that these Canadian schools do use a sliding scale based on the specific programs you apply to; some programs will be more difficult to get into than others, and they look for different kinds of preparation.  For an example of what I mean, go to this link for McGill, where a table will lay out basic application requirements:  McGill Admissions.   You’ll pay about as much at these universities as you would in state at some of our public schools, and they match or are cheaper than out of state tuition for most American schools.  I’ll offer more analysis on costs in future posts.

If you are open to an international setting, also consider  Great Britain–universities like St. Andrews and the University of Edinburgh have been accepting increasing numbers of Americans.  Edinburgh, as an example, looks for a GPA over 3.0 and solid SAT scores–at 1800 or above. Compare this to, oh, Princeton, with an average GPA of 3.9 and a lower range SAT score around 2100–your chances of getting in with 2011 and a 3.9 are very iffy–or look at Stanford, where 50% of the students have a 4.0 or better, with the SAT  scores similar to Princeton.    Not to mention the price tag for tuition.

A 3.7 with a 2000 SAT, on the other hand,  is a shoo-in at many excellent international schools. In fact, I had several 3.5 range clients very happily accept admissions to Canadian and English universities this year.   And these are bargain in many other ways as well.  More on all of this soon . . . And on getting your essays started.

Check back in with me periodically over the coming months; I will be adding posts,  once a week, on average, well into the summer.   In addition, you may e-mail me with specific questions–I do develop blog topics as a result of client and public requests.  Do keep in mind, however, that as I begin to offer more specific advice, particularly on essay development for some of the more challenging, university-specific prompts (Chicago, anyone?), that some posts will be fully available only for a (small) fee, on my private blog, though you will be able to read an excerpt here.  You can also contact me to subscribe to my private blog, with full access to all posts for this year and in the archives.  Cheers.