Scathing Summary of Northeastern Admissions

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The UVA argument is thin. They removed the supplemental essay, which I think was a mistake. It boosted applications and somewhat reduced acceptance rate.

But, they differ in important ways.

1. Unlike NEU and Tulane (and to a lesser extent, Vandy, UChicago, NYU and many SLACS), they don't accept most of their class through ED to lock in the financial commitment under the guise of competitiveness.

2. Most importantly, the don't stash less-than students at alternate campuses to game the numbers. This is the big one. UVA doesn't include other campuses (other Virginia public schools) in their numbers. If they renamed the campuses UVA-Williamsburg, UVA-Harrisonburg, UVA-Fairfax etc...and sent rejected applicants to those campuses while not counting them in the admissions stats, you'd have a fair comparison. But, of course, they don't.

Those admitted to the "non Boston" campuses are not "less than". They are simply more likely to be Full pay students (because FA doesn't apply for those campuses in the typical manner). My 1540/3.98UW/10AP kid was admitted to one of them a few years ago. Chose not to go and is much happier with their ultimate choice. But I wouldn't call their stats "less than".

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:QS World University Rankings is more respected and reliable than USNWR

2026 QS World University Rankings
#1 MIT
#5 Harvard
#88 Boston University
#334 Tufts
#384 Northeastern

This is a more accurate number to go by.

except that nobody cares about it even those international students, but suit yourself.

Actually it is the gold standard across the world, including the educated within the USA.

No, the "THE" ranking has always been more respected globally than "QS".

That said, it weights research output quite heavily, more so than other outputs such as class size, graduation in 4 years, admission rate, student experience, strength of individual departments. So it favors a huge school like University of Toronto (which is known in Canada as "University of Tears" because of the poor student experience/weeding out) which has 50,000 undergrads in the downtown campus and classes of over 500 students.

It's a good ranking for some criteria and graduate research output, but not meaningful for most undergraduate teens making a college choice.

Industry standard graduation rate is based on 6 years considering some programs are based on 5 years, students changing majors, double majors, transfer, certain majors like engineering often takes more than 4 years, etc.

As parents, we are looking closely at the 4-year graduation rates because that is important to us (who pay tuition) and our student.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not sure how different what northeastern does is compared to other schools with alternative starts but I do know (from the employer end) that a young person who has done a 6+ month coops is generally a lot more appealing than one who has done a 2 month internship.

🤔 4 year University, mine (and most of his peers) had 2 month internships all 4 years at 4 different companies. Class of 2025 grads achieved a 96% landed rate immediately to within 6 months. Business school 98% / Liberal Arts 94%

That’s not the same as 6 months at the same company (or 6 months at two different companies) as you surely know.

Coops exist at many schools, especially in STEM/engineering and have for decades. Half my friends did coops (and graduated in 5 years) 30+ years ago from a T10 school. Coops are nothing new/special.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Take it with an obvious grain of salt as this was an Instagram post from a college advisor and quasi-influencer, but I happen to agree with the substance:

Northeastern isn’t a bad school. They just LIE, a lot.

That 5% acceptance rate is completely manufactured. They only count students admitted to the Boston campus. Meanwhile thousands more get accepted into NUin, Global Scholars, London, Oakland, and now NYC. For the class of 2028 alone, only about 2,700 students were admitted to Boston, but over 3,300 more got in through those other programs that conveniently don’t show up in the number. If you count everyone they actually accept, the real rate is way higher than 5%. And be honest, who’s dreaming of spending their freshman year at Northeastern’s Oakland campus? Nobody applied to Northeastern for that.

They’ve rigged the front end too. No supplemental essays. Test optional. Applying to Northeastern is basically a one-click process through the Common App, which is exactly the point. The more unqualified applicants they attract, the lower that rate looks on paper.

Total cost of attendance at Northeastern runs around $90–94K a year. Harvard is about $87K with WAY more aid at Harvard. You’re paying more than Harvard for a degree that no one is that impressed by.

Now I already know the Northeastern crowd is gonna flood my comments bragging about their co-ops. A co-op is an internship. That’s it. The rest of us can apply for internships on our own, graduate on time, and we don’t have to pay $94,000 a year for the privilege.

Now is Northeastern worth going to sometimes? Yes. Of course. If it’s your LOWEST cost option. At least then you’re getting value for your money🤷‍♂️

I agree with this mostly as well. Northeastern isn't terrible but it has a strategy and intent to be misleading. They've been gaming the USNWR rankings methodology for 5 years (there's a whole chapter on their shenanigans in Selingo's "Who Gets In" book) which enabled them to jump 40 places in a short, short time and this strategy culminated with them overpaying for the shrewd but also somewhat shady former Head of Admissions at Tulane to come over to NU and replicate his heavy handed and misleading urgency tactics that pressed a lot of kids to apply, apply ED and commit to Tulane (also featured in Selingo's book as a cautionary tale and red flag). There's no question they have aggressive sales tactics, and massively benefit from kids wanting to study in the Boston area but being unable to get into Harvard, MIT, Tufts, Wellesley, BU/BC etc. It's not illegal, but some of their tactics are shady and exploit student immaturity and admissions anxiety. So I'm not a fan, and I strongly discouraged my kid from applying.

My kid also wanted to add NEU to the list (we have family in Boston) because he liked the location and ranking, but we had read Selingo's book and done our own research on NEU so we didn't let him.

[Anonymous]

The kids getting into NEU for Boston are the same kids getting into BU. BU has their College of General Studies and a spring admit program as big as NEU's NU.in program.

Northeastern had a strategy to avoid becoming a Syracuse or American University and it implemented it.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2024/08/09/metro/northeastern-university-college-career-preparation/

Today D’Amore is the chairman of Northeastern’s board of trustees, most of whom, he said, “like myself, often joke [that] we love Northeastern, but we couldn’t get in today.”

These days, Northeastern admits students more like Neoli Das, the daughter of Indian immigrants living in Silicon Valley, who finished high school with a 3.8 GPA and a resume of internships. She fell in love with Boston during a summer Harvard Extension School program, and with Northeastern because of its distinctive co-op program and cosmopolitan vibe.

“I feel like I fit right in,” Das said after her July orientation program for incoming first-year students.

In the space of one generation, Northeastern University has undergone a complete metamorphosis. The former commuter school that used to admit nearly everyone — 88 percent of applicants in 1990 — is now as hard to get into as Amherst or Bowdoin College. Demographic declines in college-age students and crushing financial pressures have forced dozens of higher education institutions to close in recent years, and many more are on the brink, but Northeastern has been gobbling up struggling schools and expanding its holdings, across the country and around the world. The total cost of attending, before financial aid, has ballooned from less than $16,000 in 1990 to more than $90,000 this year, but that hasn’t slowed demand for spots: the applicant pool has grown tenfold over that period.
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Why did the old Northeastern have to go and this new one rise in its place? Survival.
The school faced an existential crisis 30 years ago, a budget gap of $17 million in 1991, and saw that drawing more students from high-income families willing to pay top-dollar for tuition would offer a huge boost to the bottom line.

Change was essential, university administrators past and present say. And as its focus has shifted to attracting brand-conscious consumers willing to pay tuition rates on par with more established schools, Northeastern needed to look and feel more like MIT and less like a community college.
School officials also felt Northeastern needed to appeal to students outside the Boston area, and to become a more diverse academic community. Both goals have been met. Where 30 years ago, the vast majority of Northeastern students came from Massachusetts, now the university recruits from all over the world, with 67 percent of its graduate students from other countries, and 14 percent of undergraduates, according to the university.

And the makeup of students has significantly changed; more

[Anonymous]

The idea that somehow NEU has transformed itself into an elite university should raise a lot of eyebrows. It is a fine school, but let's not get carried away.

For a more accurate view of NEU, both of these rankings are more reputable than the USNWR.

Times Higher Education 2026 World Rankings
#2 MIT
#5 Harvard
#76 Boston University
#189 Tufts
#201-250 Northeastern

2026 QS World University Rankings
#1 MIT
#5 Harvard
#88 Boston University
#334 Tufts
#384 Northeastern

[Anonymous]

From where it was from the 1990's its transformation has been pretty remarkable. Its business school is ranked top 15 by poets and quants, its engineering/comp sci/AI programs are considered top tier. Its premed program feeds kids into top schools. Its co-op program is the gold standard of internships. It attracts high stats applicants. And it offers space for extra kids through NU.in because of the artificial cap the city of Boston places on campus beds.

It is also ahead of the game in buying the Oakland campus. Look at what Michigan has done since, or Vanderbilt. You adapt or you die.

[Anonymous]

I think the people on here who keep spitting out rankings are missing the point. The whole "rise" of Northeastern has been a deliberate strategy not to improve quality or student experience, but to climb all the rankings they could. USNWR was most important to them, but other rankings matter to them too. It's what they prioritize and focus on. Why else would the hire that scammy guy from Tulane who ran their admission strategy?

Finally, I hate "one size fits all" rankings because they don't fit all. For example, my kid cares about the quality of student community (collaborative, intellectual, kind) and class size as well as strength of faculty and major, and finally location.

Northeastern being in Boston is such a wonderful location to go to college. There are 10+ colleges with access to Boston, so it's far from the only choice. But each has different admission profile, culture, vibe.

I will say that BU does engage in some of NEU's tactics - like offering guaranteed transfers and delayed semesters so that they can hide the admissions and stats of those admits. Vandy, NYU and USC do this too.

I think there's a lot of defensiveness from NEU boosters on this thread and regurgitation of random and various rankings (global or national) don't really make their points effectively.

Our argument is their tactics and quality, not some BS rankings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the people on here who keep spitting out rankings are missing the point. The whole "rise" of Northeastern has been a deliberate strategy not to improve quality or student experience, but to climb all the rankings they could. USNWR was most important to them, but other rankings matter to them too. It's what they prioritize and focus on. Why else would the hire that scammy guy from Tulane who ran their admission strategy?

Finally, I hate "one size fits all" rankings because they don't fit all. For example, my kid cares about the quality of student community (collaborative, intellectual, kind) and class size as well as strength of faculty and major, and finally location.

Northeastern being in Boston is such a wonderful location to go to college. There are 10+ colleges with access to Boston, so it's far from the only choice. But each has different admission profile, culture, vibe.

I will say that BU does engage in some of NEU's tactics - like offering guaranteed transfers and delayed semesters so that they can hide the admissions and stats of those admits. Vandy, NYU and USC do this too.

I think there's a lot of defensiveness from NEU boosters on this thread and regurgitation of random and various rankings (global or national) don't really make their points effectively.

Our argument is their tactics and quality, not some BS rankings.

Well said.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think the people on here who keep spitting out rankings are missing the point. The whole "rise" of Northeastern has been a deliberate strategy not to improve quality or student experience, but to climb all the rankings they could. USNWR was most important to them, but other rankings matter to them too. It's what they prioritize and focus on. Why else would the hire that scammy guy from Tulane who ran their admission strategy?

Finally, I hate "one size fits all" rankings because they don't fit all. For example, my kid cares about the quality of student community (collaborative, intellectual, kind) and class size as well as strength of faculty and major, and finally location.

Northeastern being in Boston is such a wonderful location to go to college. There are 10+ colleges with access to Boston, so it's far from the only choice. But each has different admission profile, culture, vibe.

I will say that BU does engage in some of NEU's tactics - like offering guaranteed transfers and delayed semesters so that they can hide the admissions and stats of those admits. Vandy, NYU and USC do this too.

I think there's a lot of defensiveness from NEU boosters on this thread and regurgitation of random and various rankings (global or national) don't really make their points effectively.

Our argument is their tactics and quality, not some BS rankings.

You are totally backward.
Quality of student experience and satisfaction at NU is top-notch.
It's reflected in the retention rate - https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities/freshmen-least-most-likely-return
It's top 20 on par with schools like Duke, Princeton, JHU, Georgetown, etc.

How do you make this possible? threaten students to come back?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The idea that somehow NEU has transformed itself into an elite university should raise a lot of eyebrows. It is a fine school, but let's not get carried away.

For a more accurate view of NEU, both of these rankings are more reputable than the USNWR.

Times Higher Education 2026 World Rankings
#2 MIT
#5 Harvard
#76 Boston University
#189 Tufts
#201-250 Northeastern

2026 QS World University Rankings
#1 MIT
#5 Harvard
#88 Boston University
#334 Tufts
#384 Northeastern

Yes agree. And for the chicago hating mom who compares northestern to uchicago

UChicago rankings (2026)
Ranking System Position
Times Higher Education (THE) 2026 ~#13
QS World University Rankings 2026 ~#21

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue is that Northeastern counts the total applicant count in the denominator but not the numerator, which is, at best, misleading and realistically, an outward lie.

All of the full-pay admits to their portfolio of campuses around the world are not calculated in their admission rate. In fact, they are misleadingly considered rejected in the calculation (and the GPA, test scores of the non-Boston admits aren't incorporated either).

Ugh how misleading. And it's included in all the rankings too. Then because it appears to be more selective than it is, gullible teens apply thinking it's a proxy for quality.

Acceptance rate is not even counted toward ranking at least for the gold standard ranking for undergrad, USN&WR.

Gold standard? That is like the gold standard for Astrology.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue is that Northeastern counts the total applicant count in the denominator but not the numerator, which is, at best, misleading and realistically, an outward lie.

All of the full-pay admits to their portfolio of campuses around the world are not calculated in their admission rate. In fact, they are misleadingly considered rejected in the calculation (and the GPA, test scores of the non-Boston admits aren't incorporated either).

Ugh how misleading. And it's included in all the rankings too. Then because it appears to be more selective than it is, gullible teens apply thinking it's a proxy for quality.

Sounds like your kid didn’t do his research so now you’re all butthurt about it.

Northeastern is very clear about the multiple locations. Anyone who is “duped” didn’t do basic research.

Kids who are looking at highly selective colleges figure it out.

Not everyone is obsessed with rankings and selectivity as you.

[Anonymous]

I went to college in boston

It was well known that the Northeastern kids had a snipe with their co-op program

And I had that experience as a law student from H who had a summer job at this one firm, but they took that other kid because they thought he would stick around.

I did not stick around, and he didn't stick around, either.

The whole law firm doesn't exist anymore.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the people on here who keep spitting out rankings are missing the point. The whole "rise" of Northeastern has been a deliberate strategy not to improve quality or student experience, but to climb all the rankings they could. USNWR was most important to them, but other rankings matter to them too. It's what they prioritize and focus on. Why else would the hire that scammy guy from Tulane who ran their admission strategy?

Finally, I hate "one size fits all" rankings because they don't fit all. For example, my kid cares about the quality of student community (collaborative, intellectual, kind) and class size as well as strength of faculty and major, and finally location.

Northeastern being in Boston is such a wonderful location to go to college. There are 10+ colleges with access to Boston, so it's far from the only choice. But each has different admission profile, culture, vibe.

I will say that BU does engage in some of NEU's tactics - like offering guaranteed transfers and delayed semesters so that they can hide the admissions and stats of those admits. Vandy, NYU and USC do this too.

I think there's a lot of defensiveness from NEU boosters on this thread and regurgitation of random and various rankings (global or national) don't really make their points effectively.

Our argument is their tactics and quality, not some BS rankings.

You are totally backward.
Quality of student experience and satisfaction at NU is top-notch.
It's reflected in the retention rate - https://www.usnews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities/freshmen-least-most-likely-return
It's top 20 on par with schools like Duke, Princeton, JHU, Georgetown, etc.

How do you make this possible? threaten students to come back?

Bro, you really think Northeastern Uni is on par with Duke, Princeton, Hopkins, Georgetown? It's on par with GW maybe (if you take out the amazing Elliott school).