20 plus applications

[Anonymous]

I check out college confidential from time to time, and am shocked to see kids reporting they applied to 20 plus schools (one kid reported 30 plus). These are high stat kids “shotgunning” every school in the T20 or T30 and doing pretty well with acceptances. Of course, they can only attend one. It just seems completely ridiculous that their high schools allow this.

[Anonymous]

Yes. Last year, when my kid was applying, some parent had twins, and they were maxing out Common and Coalition Apps to apply to 30+ schools each fishing for max merit aid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes. Last year, when my kid was applying, some parent had twins, and they were maxing out Common and Coalition Apps to apply to 30+ schools each fishing for max merit aid.

To me, this is where it makes sense. If you're a donut hole family, it's not clear where the merit scholarship might come from, so you cast a wide net.

[Anonymous]

My son's friend did this, without changing his personal statement or paying great attention to supplemental essays. My son, on the other hand, burned out after 6 applications (plus McGill, which does not require essays), because he spent a lot of time writing thoughtful essays for each college.

We'll see what happens. For the moment, DS is in at UMD Honors. I do think a thoughtful essay made the difference, since there are so many indistinguishable high stats applicants.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes. Last year, when my kid was applying, some parent had twins, and they were maxing out Common and Coalition Apps to apply to 30+ schools each fishing for max merit aid.

Did this work for them?

[Anonymous]

Kids are doing this because acceptances at the higher ranked school are such a lottery and unpredictable. I don't blame them.

[Anonymous]

High schools should not be able to dictate how many colleges a student applies to.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I check out college confidential from time to time, and am shocked to see kids reporting they applied to 20 plus schools (one kid reported 30 plus). These are high stat kids “shotgunning” every school in the T20 or T30 and doing pretty well with acceptances. Of course, they can only attend one. It just seems completely ridiculous that their high schools allow this.

If this becomes the culture at a high school the colleges will start blacklisitng kids from that high school in future years. colleges track their matriculation rates.

[Anonymous]

According to the latest Common App report (2022 cycle), students with SAT scores (ACT equiv) of 1500+ (76,747 applicants) submitted on average 9 applications.

24% of students with scores >1400 submitted 10-14 applications and 28% submitted more than 15.

No surprise, but high volume applicants are applying to highly selective schools: "Naturally, this effect would tend to result in a greater concentration of high-volume applicants in the pools of the most selective members."

https://s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/ca.research.publish/Research_Briefs_2022/2022_12_09_Apps_Per_Applicant_ResearchBrief.pdf

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:According to the latest Common App report (2022 cycle), students with SAT scores (ACT equiv) of 1500+ (76,747 applicants) submitted on average 9 applications.

24% of students with scores >1400 submitted 10-14 applications and 28% submitted more than 15.

No surprise, but high volume applicants are applying to highly selective schools: "Naturally, this effect would tend to result in a greater concentration of high-volume applicants in the pools of the most selective members."

https://s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/ca.research.publish/Research_Briefs_2022/2022_12_09_Apps_Per_Applicant_ResearchBrief.pdf

If a qualified applicant has a 10-20% chance at any given school and the chances at any given school are unrelated to the chances at other schools, it makes sense to shotgun applications

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I check out college confidential from time to time, and am shocked to see kids reporting they applied to 20 plus schools (one kid reported 30 plus). These are high stat kids “shotgunning” every school in the T20 or T30 and doing pretty well with acceptances. Of course, they can only attend one. It just seems completely ridiculous that their high schools allow this.

If this becomes the culture at a high school the colleges will start blacklisitng kids from that high school in future years. colleges track their matriculation rates.

Blacklisting a high school where large numbers of strong students want to apply to their college - and pay application fee - so then the college gets to pick which "one" they want to accept among them? I don't see this happening. Colleges can't see where else kids have applied.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:According to the latest Common App report (2022 cycle), students with SAT scores (ACT equiv) of 1500+ (76,747 applicants) submitted on average 9 applications.

24% of students with scores >1400 submitted 10-14 applications and 28% submitted more than 15.

No surprise, but high volume applicants are applying to highly selective schools: "Naturally, this effect would tend to result in a greater concentration of high-volume applicants in the pools of the most selective members."

https://s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/ca.research.publish/Research_Briefs_2022/2022_12_09_Apps_Per_Applicant_ResearchBrief.pdf

Do they remove all the student who did ED first and were accepted? Because that's a large set of 1's to pull down the average.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:According to the latest Common App report (2022 cycle), students with SAT scores (ACT equiv) of 1500+ (76,747 applicants) submitted on average 9 applications.

24% of students with scores >1400 submitted 10-14 applications and 28% submitted more than 15.

No surprise, but high volume applicants are applying to highly selective schools: "Naturally, this effect would tend to result in a greater concentration of high-volume applicants in the pools of the most selective members."

https://s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/ca.research.publish/Research_Briefs_2022/2022_12_09_Apps_Per_Applicant_ResearchBrief.pdf

If a qualified applicant has a 10-20% chance at any given school and the chances at any given school are unrelated to the chances at other schools, it makes sense to shotgun applications

I understand why kids are doing it but the reality is it will only get worse for students because if more students submit 15+ applications to the same pool of T100 schools, the 10-20% chance will decrease to 5-10%, especially when you are competing with potentially 76000+ kids with at least a 1500 SAT score (ACT equivalent) and an additional 98000+ in the 1400 range.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Kids are doing this because acceptances at the higher ranked school are such a lottery and unpredictable. I don't blame them.

Applying to this many schools only makes results less predictable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:According to the latest Common App report (2022 cycle), students with SAT scores (ACT equiv) of 1500+ (76,747 applicants) submitted on average 9 applications.

24% of students with scores >1400 submitted 10-14 applications and 28% submitted more than 15.

No surprise, but high volume applicants are applying to highly selective schools: "Naturally, this effect would tend to result in a greater concentration of high-volume applicants in the pools of the most selective members."

https://s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/ca.research.publish/Research_Briefs_2022/2022_12_09_Apps_Per_Applicant_ResearchBrief.pdf

Do they remove all the student who did ED first and were accepted? Because that's a large set of 1's to pull down the average.

Yes, according to the footnotes in the report.