150k applications to ucla? I feel for both the students who genuinely want to attend a certain school and the schools who have to sift through all of these applications and deal with ridiculous yield. Is a common app helpful for biographical data? Sure. But what the fuck is the point of 150k applications???! Fuck!
people can apply to 20 schools. The poorest would get waived and the middle gets squeezed.
The days of slogging through doing 3-6 unique apps as a HS senior in the Fall seem far away. I don't think anyone applied to more than 6 back in my day. Too much work for the student.
owns it could implement that.
Shits crazy. Cannot wait to go through this 6 times.
The same application is used for all the UCs, the student just clicks that he wants to apply to a campus and pays the $70 per campus. Each campus makes its own decision.
Most of my son's friends applied to all the "popular" UCs (listed below with their US News Ranking for what its worth). These schools are a great deal for in state students. My son will attend UCSB next year. Tuition is 14K a year, room and board is 16K.
All of these schools receive more than 100K applications a year.
UCLA #20
UC Berkeley #22
UC Santa Barbara #28
UC San Diego #34
UC Irvine #36
UC Davis #38
For residency. It’s a very elegant algorithm. It would really help sort out which students prefer UCLA versus which ones prefer Cal and so on.
but the current system has the "benefit" of increasing applications and decreasing acceptance rates - which helps the rankings. But student would be better served with ability to state preference. As it is now, they just apply to them all, and probably often get into their 3 or 4th choice.
You needed to be a good student but you did not need to be specatacular and thus whole families could go to the same school (assuming decent students) because it was not universally desired. When I went the acceptance was probably close to 50%. Those days are long gone of course.
Why waitlist 3000 students when only 107 were admitted off the waitlist last year? I'm sure they have a reason. Do they expect 2800 or more to tell them to go scratch when they reach out to try to admit in August? Maybe I've answered my own question but I would think most ND applicants would drop everything and go, even at a late date.
Then again, maybe not.
but the reason they give is that they don't know who will be coming. IOW if the girl floutist who wants to study engineering goes to Princeton, they'll go to the waitlist for another girl floutist as opposed to #1 on the waitlist.
This is of course a ham fisted analogy but it is probably the better way to look at the wait list and why it is so large.
perhaps it is marketing (you can tell an alum "your child almost got in"). Also, perhaps they can squeeze this group for donations - implied if you had given more....
Yeah - I know, that is an incredibly cynical take. But if taking 100 or fewer I see no reason why the list would be over 1,000. They had the early admits and already know how much of the class is coming from that group.
I believe the financial aid decisions are made before waitlist applicants are added to incoming class. So it can favor those who will pay full tuition.
...includes as one of its allegations that certain schools consider financial need in making waitlist admissions. Notre Dame is not one of the defendants listed in that allegation. Which doesn't necessarily mean they aren't doing it, but apparently at least as compared with other schools the plaintiffs found no evidence of it.
Need blind - perhaps that doesn't apply after the initial acceptances happen. You could at that point KNOW you need more full payors.
Lots of school have seen 25% increases in the last couple of years due the now widespread practice of making SAT/ACT optional. In the case of the huge Univ of Calif system, scores cannot be used - admissions is test blind. Huge growth in applications.
UCLA had 150K applications this year.
At least for about 40-50 schools.
The world is a tough place though for many, many schools and there are some bargains out there. You hear the stories. Some schools "buy" great students.
It's tougher to get into than SC.
33% of admitted students did not submit test scores
41% of students are of color - maybe they should learn from Harvard and UNC
20-22 % students are eligible for Pell grants or under $65k household income
Only 33 % admitted students are from Catholic schools
Great stats ND !
Good evidence has shown that test scores have very little to do with success at college and in life. Wake Forest has gone almost 10 years now without test scores being required, and monitors it closely with no discernable difference in performance and success between those who did and did not submit test scores. NDs release clearly identifies that they are looking for more holistic qualities - why is that not a good thing? There are plenty of schools that still prioritize academic robots, I don't want ND to be one of them.
...particularly strongly either way.
1. It is true that research has generally shown that high school GPA is a better predictor of college success than SAT/ACT. However, the same research has also typically shown that "GPA + SAT/ACT" is a better predictor of college success than GPA alone.
2. While there are potential equity concerns with relying on SAT/ACT scores given the potential for expensive private tutoring to boost results, the potential for wealth to distort the admissions process under a "holistic approach" is even greater. Case in point - one of my colleagues was recently raving about an undergraduate who had attended annual meetings of the American Economic Association while still in high school. This showed "drive, intellectual curiousity, etc., etc." You know what else it showed? Parents with enough money to fly him around the country to attend meetings as an extracurricular activity.
Particularly if one's argument is that the SAT/ACT should be gotten rid of because it favors the privileged, be careful what you wish for because a holistic approach is even easier for the rich and well-connected to game. They're the ones in a position to help their kids pile up the independent research opportunities, unique social service projects, etc. that can be difficult for admissions committees not to gravitate towards.
However GPA+________ fill in the blank is also just as good of a predictor.
During COVID, because almost all standardized tests were cancelled for an entire year straight, most universities went away from requiring the tests. But plenty had already gone away before that, and I think few will go back.
What my kids' high school college counselors say is that "it's something that can make your application more attractive so if you have a fantastic SAT score, by all means submit it." But like so many other things, it's just one piece and there are other ways to get that +__________"
Simply, I think schools would rather have students with a strong GPA who have shown strong initiative, creativity, work ethic, and a curiosity of the world more than a strong GPA and SAT score.
I wonder what the true "predictors" of success are. High grades in high school? Willingness to take the most difficult classes (and in that case, does it matter whether the grades are A's, B's, or C's)?
You mention here that Wake actually monitors academic progress closely post-admission--I wonder if ND does the same thing.
I am an ACT/SAT-required advocate for one reason in today's world. I think it is a cross check against the rest of the student's resume. I don't think schools should even publish the median scores, but one thing that has been sorely disappointing about high schools (at least in my area) is the prevalence of cheating, even among top students, in high school. I like the idea of the SAT/ACT as a check on that. I also think there are other "balancing factors" that maybe colleges could implement, like requiring applicants to report the SAT/ACT score, but also report (1) whether they had a tutor or prep class (and who), and (2) how many times you've taken the test. Colleges could weigh those factors how they please.
Carry an extremely high weight. I am hardly an expert in this as I’ve only been through this process with one child however the private school that my kids go to prides itself on having a top caliber college counseling department. There are six college counselors dedicated to a school with 120 students in each class. Everyone of those college counselors was the admissions representative for our region for a well respected university. What they told us is that while Academic performance is of course important, that just lays the initial foundation. As others have mentioned, GPA and class rank is put into the context of the school they come from and when they were working for their respective universities one of their main jobs was to know the high schools in their area of responsibility. Specifically, to know things like an unweighted 3.7 at school A might actually indicate stronger academic performance than an unweighted 4.0 at school B.
My daughter was the 3.75 kid, but she comes from a high school that is known to be demanding and not prone to any grade inflation. And as we have heard from many of her high school friends, she has found college to be easier than she expected- still hard but not as hard as she expected and the amount of homework and material that is comparable to high school. Friends of hers at her university now, who were rockstar straight A kids in high school, are incredibly stressed about the volume and intensity of the work.
And as discussed elsewhere in the thread, Universities want two things numbers wise: they want a low acceptance rate but they want a high number of accepted students to matriculate. They want to be hard to get into but those that get in all want to go there. Which is why they look at so many other factors, essays very high on the list, but also other things like did you visit campus, did you sign up for email lists, do you participate in webinars, do you open all of the emails that they send you, etc. all of those things demonstrate interest and will help differentiate the strong academic student who is casting a wide net and a strong academic student who is laser focused on their school
I want to put a plug-in for Dennis Ellers again, who posts here as 02Dad and runs a college counseling service. A couple of the admissions people that we met at Wake Forest after our daughter matriculated remembered her and her essays and how interesting they thought they were. That an admissions person actually remembered her essays and specifically mentioned them really tells me how much focus they put on them. We feel the essays (and Wake has a LOT of them) allowed her to tell her unique story about who she is as a person and why she would be such an asset to Wake. I was blown away at her essays, and they were all her (Dennis guided her on how to move things around and expand on certain points/minimize other points, but the essays were all her).
How does your daughter like Wake? That's on my son's interest list for next year.
almost entirely a function of a terrible roommate and an initial friend group that turned out to be toxic. She's found her "people" now and is doing much better
I will say, I think she would have been overall a little happier at her second and third choice schools, but I think she is happy enough and she loves the academic environment. She fully recognizes that the quality of academics that she is getting is excellent, and that the degree from Wake will open some doors for her down the line that her other schools would not. She's definitely happy enough that she doesn't want to leave, and I suspect that will only get stronger as time goes on.
Nathan Hatch was the President of Wake Forest for 15 years (he retired last year), before that he was the Provost at Notre Dame. Many at Wake talk about the "Notre Dame-ification" of Wake Forest under Dr. Hatch. Except for the religious aspect, and the presence of fraternities and sororities, Wake feels a lot like Notre Dame. Strong focus on the undergraduate experience and the residence life experience, tons of support on the physical and well-being of students, highly engaged and accessible faculty, focus on smaller more intimate classroom experience, etc. Like ND, the athletes live in the dorms with the students, and some of her best friends this year were a group of freshman football players that live on her floor (the floors of the dorms are divided into same sex wings but the sings join at common areas where everyone hangs out). Because it's a small campus and everyone lives in the dorms, like at ND she says it's not them rooting for faceless football players, its her getting excited when her buddies from the dorm get in the game to play.
My daughter grew up wanting to go to Notre Dame, but two things turned her off at the end
a) she has become less religious as she's developed her own thoughts, and she wasn't sure she wanted to be immersed in that environment, and
b) she hates the cold
So Wake turned out be exactly what she wanted - small liberal arts university with strong sciences, big focus on the undergraduate experience, major D1 athletics, and good weather.
The town of Winston Salem kicks ass. I love it there. It's growing so fast. Wake built their sciences/biotech campus in an abandoned warehouse district downtown, and now "Wake Downtown" is a thriving downtown scene with a constantly increasing number of shops, converted loft apartments, hip restaurants, breweries, etc. surrounding Wake Downtown and the medical campus. And of course the main campus is beautiful, and with Wake's success the last 6 years in football, a ton of money is pouring in and there is a lot of development on campus. You can't go anywhere without some amazing new building/center going up.
My email is linked, if you have any further questions.
runs the program held a meeting a couple weeks ago. Was fascinating to me what a science it is and how they know specifically what to teach based upon the tests. Made a believer out of me that it seems stupid at this point. Basically came down to knowing a couple different math and grammar rules really well to raise your score a bunch. IF that is the case its value seems minimal to me.
Are created equal. Valedictorian at the public school in my hometown might be 50th in their class at the private school across the street. Standardized tests help to inform in that situation as well.
I would match our top graduates against the best private schools around. They are really bright and I think they get no credit for it bc we are public HS in Tennessee.
the quality of education from various public institutions. I'd bet ND would know the difference.
at knowing what high school you came from, how you performed at that school, and how that will correlate with your college performance. It's much more sophisticated than people realize, and I think it's a far cry more sophisticated than we were applying out of high school
Like me, and many of my friends from ND. And I echo the questions below.
I asked the question to give the poster the benefit of the doubt.
Is that ND doesn't admit enough middle class white catholics from traditional feeder schools and is embracing "woke" ideologies
I actually considered initially that one might think that the university didn't go far enough to develop a diverse student body, both racially and economically, but I thought the numbers seemed to show at least significant efforts in that regard.
and by publishing the stats I believe it is their message. I am all for diversity but when you see the stats of the students not admitted (my son included) the article reads that ND checked all the boxes.
Not sure I would say "Woke" because I'm 52 and not hip or cool. But the point is the University that my father and brother graduated years ago is quite different than it is today.
Do you think the University admitted too many minorities?
did they admit the most qualified people that are in-line with the schools foundation and history.
who is the son of a grad and all siblings attended who recgnizes my sons will not attend.
Lets stipulate that priobably 95% of the kids who were denied admission are every bit as qualified as the kids who were admitted. The University is choosing from the best of the best. My oldest is at a private non-Catholic HS which equates to 20% of the admits which means like 700 kids in country. That is a pretty damn small pool.
The bigger issue is that all the schools have gone through similar "growth". What once were considered safety schools now have very competitive admissions similar to ND in the 1980's so parents are now stressing about getting into even those schools.
The current make up of the Catholic Church rather than make up of the school 50-100 years ago. 50-100 years ago the make up of the school mirrored the make up of Catholics in America, who were mostly European immigrants. The make up of the Catholic Church looks a lot different these days
Although 22% is not totally out-of-whack with most universities (and not just elite ones) unfortunately.
"The University set a record-low acceptance rate of 12.9% this year, replacing last year’s record-low of 14.6%."
Bragging about turning away 87% of applicants in a release like this is unseemly...save that shit for the rankings bodies (e.g., U.S. News).
If you feel the need to call this out (rather than simply let people do the math), why not just say something like, "The acceptance rate declined from 14.6% to 12.9%"? No need to use terminology like "record-low".
That was not in a (public) ND press release. It's not clear how that information was received. Obviously, she had to (or presumably did, assuming she's a high-quality journalist) get that information from ND, but it's not clear if that was via a question she asked to Bishop or a press release/statement distributed to media/the Observer. It's even possible it was not mentioned by ND this year, but the number was known from the prior year, and the writer made the obvious logical conclusion it's the new record low. I don't see any public press release/article from ND about their 2026 class admissions anywhere on their website or any social media channels.
I do think that makes a bit of difference (even if the university provided the information directly to the Observer) compared to Bishop having a quote about how proud he was of that or the university seemingly bragging about it in a publicly-released press release.
schools..."
So the others merely sift through 20K-50K apps just looking for the academically gifted, but we add our own twist: "we really look at their creativity and motivation for learning, not just their ability to create academic results.”
OK. I'm sure that is unique to ND among the Top 15. To me, simply say you sought those qualities. You really have little reason and basis to opine on what others do. That said, the real difference is that we are a truly aspiring to deliver a faith-informed education. Kids have to want that and not everyone does. Hopefully that difference is explained in the process to would be students.
Suffice it to say that demand for ND is clearly greater than ever and that inevitably means a more gifted talent pool from which to choose. I just hope is reflects greater diversity in socio-economic strata. The thing that bummed me out the most was seeing those WSJ reports on how "elite" the students were in terms of where they came from (top 5% and top 1%) - much greater than other top schools. I seem to recall BC was high up there as well in that regard. That concentration is not good for ND (and I say that as one blessed financially - as are many alums).
Good luck to the new students. You will clearly be among future leaders of people, business, politics, academics and sport.
I became an aficionado of the Don Bishop talking points as B19 went through the admissions process last year. Don is entertaining and a ND institution, but he subscribes to "true once, true eternally" school of using numbers to make your case.
The high water mark for ND in the USNWR national university rankings was #15, which it has done I think twice in the past 10 years. Ergo, ND is "Top 15." He actually has a whole rap where eventually he gets us into the Top 5, but it was Jedi-level "these aren't the droids you're looking for" advocacy and I can't remember how he constructed the daisy-chain.
I will say in fairness to ND that among the top [z] schools, ND has a reputation as being a little less (just a little less)beholden to stats and numbers in the admissions process and a little more (just a little more) focused on "whole picture" and things like essays, service, etc.
My son and his friends are also a lot more open with each other about the aid they are or aren't receiving than we were back in the day. It's only anecdotal, but I was impressed with some of the need-based aid ND is providing to some of them. Like better than they got offered by Ivies. But I still think it's the case like at many schools that that aid dries up at income levels where families still have a real problem paying the full retail price.
This is why the universities love the optional-SAT/ACT paradigm. It lets them more freedom to focus less on academic merit and take whoever they want pick out applicants who they feel would be a good fit.
...recipients, first-generation, and/or from families with incomes below $65K.
Not super helpful in that first generation and modest income are lumped together, but as an example I seem to remember ND's Pell Grant percentage being more like 10% historically.
As you say, grouping together those three dilutes the information.
I thought US News was the most influential ranking system, and it seems to have ND at #19 among national universities (which excludes liberal arts schools that might otherwise rank ahead).
No one should really care about the precise rankings, but it looks like pathetic propaganda for ND to issue a statement differentiating itself from the “other” top 15 schools when ND itself doesn’t fit that criteria.
top 15”.
I'm in my 40s.
As noted in the thread earlier this week, I have no issue with universities being highly selective and don't think they need to expand their class sizes to become less so. But publicly bragging about how many people you turn away is indeed unseemly.
It will be extremely interesting in the next few years as the Chinese student applications crater (Covid 19 effect, people applying chose this prior to the pandemic and were in specific secondary schools that lead to this path, see link below) and inflation likely lead to a drop in applications. It’s disgusting that room and board is now 80k. Four years and interest is bumping close to 400k in debt at graduation. This bubble needs popping ASAP.
By and large applicants from Mainland China don't apply to ND, at least not in nearly the numbers they apply to Ivies, Stanford, NYU, USC, et al.
...debt anywhere even close to $400K for an undergraduate education. The average debt at graduation for those graduating college with loans is like $30K. The percentage of borrowers with even $100K in student loans is small, and heavily concentrated among those who have gone to law school and medical school.
One can think that private universities should not have sticker prices of $80K without pretending that it means that students graduating from college with $400K in debt is anything other than an extreme, exteme outlier.
My father is a pediatrician, I got nothing based on need (I did earn a 60% scholarship senior year as a manager.) Neither did my sister (even though she started school my senior year) and my brother only got merit scholarships (despite him starting my sisters year) average ain’t median. I would love to know that number, I suspect it’s much higher then the mean.
According to the linked site which updated the stats last October. Their numbers:
Community colleges are included in the national average.
...national averages because their need-based financial aid policies are so generous. Notre Dame's need-based aid has typically lagged behind other elites (although they've closed the gap somewhat). Last time I remember seeing ND-specific numbers that were pretty much in line with national averages. $30K-ish.
Your continued belief in significant numbers of undergraduates (whether at Notre Dame specifically or at colleges more generally) saddled with mortgage-sized debts from college is simply not based in reality. This issue has been exhaustively studied and the data are readily available.
I ask because I don't know. But colleges brag that their their tuition is a floating target and is needs based. Fine. But what that means is the school must pay extra close attention to its payer mix to make it all work. So for every kid who goes free, you need a wealthy student who can afford full freight. So for an upper middle class kid who's family looks well off enough because their parents are at peak earnings may not get very much in aid. But they've got 3 kids and the prospect of sending them all to private Catholic college after Catholic HS is going to mean considerable debt for someone. What I see in practice is choices are made.
It saddens me to see our private Catholic colleges fall prey to the same trap as most higher education institutions, where they have become far more expensive operations. It is difficult to say 'No' to the next costly idea when tuition can simply be raised.
I.e., they don't take ability to pay into account when making admissions decisions. That said, ND is among a group of schools currently being sued for price fixing on the basis that they are not in fact need blind (if you're truly need blind, you get a statutory exemption from the relevant price fixing prohibitions).
I've scanned through the complaint. The allegations aren't that convincing in my (non-expert) opinion.
But I would have to dig into more detail as to how one can prove an antitrust injury. At first blush, they hadn't alleged an antitrust injury.
...What College Admissions Offices Really Want: Elite schools say they’re looking for academic excellence and diversity. But their thirst for tuition revenue means that wealth trumps all. (Paul Tough, nytimes.com, September 10, 2019). It's rather long but fascinating, and is very relevant, I think, to exactly what's being discussed in this thread.
Here is the price fixing lawsuit in which ND is an included defendant: Sia Henry et al. v. Brown University et al.
Or at least the summary beneath the title is. Trinity College is very explicitly not a need-blind institution. They are undoubtedly and self admittedly assembling classes based on tuition revenue needs. Using them as an example in suport of the assertion that "thirst for tuition revenue" trumps all at "elite" schools (almost all of which are need-blind and better resourced than Trinity) is disingenuous on Tough's part. As the piece gets around to acknowleding, there are several other factors in play that (to me) more readily explain why need-blind schools still admit predominantly affluent classes.
...articles, and should be disregarded in favor of the content; as you note, the article does advert (at some length) to factors other than the need for tuition revenue, though he does seem to end up seeing it as, if not the primary factor, then a sort of primus inter pares. There's no doubt that other factors are also at play.
The elephants need a lot of peanuts, as the old saying goes. ND indicates that about 30% of its students get no financial aid from them. This means that 30% of about 8,800 will pay about $80,000 each for tuition, room, and board; with various upsells (student football tix and other fees), the total generated by this faction would be about $250 million per year. The other 70% contribute about $439 million to make up the total of $689 million ND reported as tuition revenue on its 2020 form 990.
Rather than respond to several posts, I'd like to group my responses in one place. As background our sons (one California state school, one ND) graduated in 95 and 96 and our daughter (ND) graduated in 2000. As a first level manager in an aerospace company and software developer, none of our children received financial aid from the schools.
Our "aid" was a parent loan that we refinanced our house and later took a job overseas (huge tax breaks). We chose (and have zero regrets) to cover the costs and leave our kids with a debt of about $5000.
Point 1: Parent loans seemed common in those days and for many students the parent/student mix of loans differed from our choice.
Point 2: People are missing the implications of median student debt (19K) and average student debt (38K). The normal distribution or bell-shaped curve, which most have some familiarity with, is symmetric - so the median and average would be real close to the same number. Some percentage of the students are balancing off the students (perhaps most of the Pell Grant recipients) with quite sizable loans. An honest presentation would break this down further - perhaps by undergrad vs grad/professional schools, by each school, and debt by decile.
Point 3: Although I have no evidence that schools try to/have to admit those paying full-freight+, it seems necessary. I would assume that the businesses known as universities expect a certain amount of tuition income to help balance the books. As an exercise in reductio ad absurdum, ND is not positioned to accept a class that is 100% Pell Grant or very low income students. It's certainly publicity that schools don't want (taking in rich kids), but I have to believe it occurs anywhere that schools rely on tuition income as a major source of revenue. Plus they're more likely to donate a dorm or endow a football coach's position.
#2 - As noted elsewhere in the thread, this is an exhaustively studided topic and the data have been broken down in just about every way imaginable. Graduates with $100K+ in loans are a single digit percentage of all borrowers. When that small percentage is further broken down as you suggest, it becomes apparent that $100K+ borrowers are heavily concentrated among those who attend law school and medical school. And note that typically these analyses are of "those who graduate with debt" and thus exclude the approximately one-third of college graduates who graduate with no debt whatsoever.
Any which way you want to slice it, there are simply not a meaningful percentage of students graduating from college with $100K+ in debt (much less the $400K figure vermin05 threw out).
#3 - As mentioned elsewhere, Notre Dame is among a group of elite schools currently being sued based on essentially the same argument you've made here. "They claim they're need blind, but as a practical matter they can't actually afford to be so they must be finding ways to take ability to pay into account." The specific allegation in the lawsuit most relevant to Notre Dame is (as best I recall) that they use sophisticated enrollment management software to project what a hypothetical admitted class will yield in net tuition based on non-income demographic information. There is also the fact that they give admissions breaks to "candidates of institutional importance" (i.e., those who can donate buildings). But while that might violate the relevant statutory law at issue in the law suit, it's not really the same thing as not being "need blind."
Which makes the debt issue a bit easier to swallow
that explain that law school once you drop out of the top couple dozen schools isnt a positive ROI experience for many/the majority of the students.
One of my nieces got into a stretch school for her academic credentials, but her zip code would certainly imply the parents could pay full price and not be eligible for aid.
I also feel that since I already had a guaranteed 4 year NROTC tuition scholarship before the acceptance letters went out, that tipped the scale in my favor. Notre Dame knew I would be paying full rate. That seems like an easy tie breaker for the admissions department.
Technically they aren’t the students so is this number being driven lower by that program?
...represent a small fraction of outstanding loan balances. I'm not sure whether or not they're included in these totals, but if they're not and you wanted to impute them to students (which would be odd if the point is to gauge the financial burden of debt on graduates) it would not meaningfully change the numbers.
I haven't seen ND's numbers in a while (2014 or 2015), but at that point the average debt at graduation for someone who had shown need was ~$16k. For all students, it was ~$29k.
The pool of aid has gone up, but cost has gone up as well.
It's a part of the brand now.