Duke’s Acceptance Rate Completely Plummeted This Year - What Happened?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hope I don't have typos here, but this is what I found:

Class of 2027, ED apps 4855, accepted 800, rate 16.5%
Class of 2026, ED apps 4015, accepted 855, rate 21%
Class of 2025, ED apps 5036, accepted 840, rate 16.7%

Pre-test optional:
Class of 2024, ED apps 4300, accepted 887, rate 20.6%
Class of 2023, ED apps 4678, accepted 882, rate 18%
Class of 2022, ED apps 4090, accepted 875, rate 21%
Class of 2021, ED apps 3516, accepted 881, rate 24.5%

So, apps increased, but did not hit the record from two years ago. However, Duke chose to admit fewer ED, so naturally the rate is lower.

The record low ED rate is essentially a mere artifact of Duke's enrollment management choices.

Duke was 15.3% this year not 16.5%. Duke actually makes their own acceptance rate look higher than it is by including Questbridge admits which no other school does when they report early acceptance rate

Thanks. I had a feeling there were typos.

I wonder what's up with Duke choosing to admit fewer in ED than usual.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Either the application numbers increased, or Duke decided to accept fewer in the ED round compared to last year, or both.

The question was likely more about why Duke’s rise in applicants was so high this year relative to other schools. Dartmouth announced need blind for internationals this year and they increased by 14% (biggest increase in Ivy League). Duke made no new policy changes and they increased in early apps by 20% compared to last year

See UVA and GA Tech’s numbers for early action and early decision and report back. The short answer is that many schools saw an increase of 15 to 20 percent in early apps, probably a response to the last two years of big drops in RD numbers.

Yes but it was an anomaly among private schools (like ivy/Stanford/Duke/MIT)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Either the application numbers increased, or Duke decided to accept fewer in the ED round compared to last year, or both.

The question was likely more about why Duke’s rise in applicants was so high this year relative to other schools. Dartmouth announced need blind for internationals this year and they increased by 14% (biggest increase in Ivy League). Duke made no new policy changes and they increased in early apps by 20% compared to last year

Agree that the question is what prompted the increase in apps.

In addition, Duke decided to admit fewer ED this year than last year (800 vs 855), but that factor was completely in Duke's control.

Many top schools (including Harvard) decided to admit less kids in the early round this year, but I’m not sure why

Fewer

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Duke ED last year was ~20% while this year it was ~15% acceptance rate. No other school experienced a drop like this, does anyone know why this might have happened?

How do you know all this?

The drop is mostly due to high anxiety, full pay striver kids using ED as the new RD to gain an edge.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Either the application numbers increased, or Duke decided to accept fewer in the ED round compared to last year, or both.

The question was likely more about why Duke’s rise in applicants was so high this year relative to other schools. Dartmouth announced need blind for internationals this year and they increased by 14% (biggest increase in Ivy League). Duke made no new policy changes and they increased in early apps by 20% compared to last year

See UVA and GA Tech’s numbers for early action and early decision and report back. The short answer is that many schools saw an increase of 15 to 20 percent in early apps, probably a response to the last two years of big drops in RD numbers.

Yes but it was an anomaly among private schools (like ivy/Stanford/Duke/MIT)

I think Vanderbilt and Georgetown also saw increases. Yale had record applications this year for REA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Hope I don't have typos here, but this is what I found:

Class of 2027, ED apps 4855, accepted 800, rate 16.5%
Class of 2026, ED apps 4015, accepted 855, rate 21%
Class of 2025, ED apps 5036, accepted 840, rate 16.7%

Pre-test optional:
Class of 2024, ED apps 4300, accepted 887, rate 20.6%
Class of 2023, ED apps 4678, accepted 882, rate 18%
Class of 2022, ED apps 4090, accepted 875, rate 21%
Class of 2021, ED apps 3516, accepted 881, rate 24.5%

So, apps increased, but did not hit the record from two years ago. However, Duke chose to admit fewer ED, so naturally the rate is lower.

The record low ED rate is essentially a mere artifact of Duke's enrollment management choices.

Duke was 15.3% this year not 16.5%. Duke actually makes their own acceptance rate look higher than it is by including Questbridge admits which no other school does when they report early acceptance rate

Thanks. I had a feeling there were typos.

I wonder what's up with Duke choosing to admit fewer in ED than usual.

Not sure but many other top schools did the same. Harvard got more applications this year but accepted fewer students

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Either the application numbers increased, or Duke decided to accept fewer in the ED round compared to last year, or both.

The question was likely more about why Duke’s rise in applicants was so high this year relative to other schools. Dartmouth announced need blind for internationals this year and they increased by 14% (biggest increase in Ivy League). Duke made no new policy changes and they increased in early apps by 20% compared to last year

Agree that the question is what prompted the increase in apps.

In addition, Duke decided to admit fewer ED this year than last year (800 vs 855), but that factor was completely in Duke's control.

Many top schools (including Harvard) decided to admit less kids in the early round this year, but I’m not sure why

Fewer

Thank you

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Duke ED last year was ~20% while this year it was ~15% acceptance rate. No other school experienced a drop like this, does anyone know why this might have happened?

How do you know all this?

The drop is mostly due to high anxiety, full pay striver kids using ED as the new RD to gain an edge.

I think PP meant no other peer school had the same sharp increase in early applications as Duke. Dartmouth was close with 14% but big drop off after that. Duke had a 20% increase in early apps from 4015 to 4855

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Duke ED last year was ~20% while this year it was ~15% acceptance rate. No other school experienced a drop like this, does anyone know why this might have happened?

How do you know all this?

The drop is mostly due to high anxiety, full pay striver kids using ED as the new RD to gain an edge.

I think PP meant no other peer school had the same sharp increase in early applications as Duke. Dartmouth was close with 14% but big drop off after that. Duke had a 20% increase in early apps from 4015 to 4855

I meant drop in acceptance rates, which correlates to an increase in applications. My original assessment stands.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Duke ED last year was ~20% while this year it was ~15% acceptance rate. No other school experienced a drop like this, does anyone know why this might have happened?

How do you know all this?

The drop is mostly due to high anxiety, full pay striver kids using ED as the new RD to gain an edge.

But no other similar school experienced this type of rise. Columbia even had fewer ED applicants, and UPenn only had a ~3% increase. Out of nowhere Duke applications shot up by 20%, which sharply dropped its acceptance rate

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Duke ED last year was ~20% while this year it was ~15% acceptance rate. No other school experienced a drop like this, does anyone know why this might have happened?

How do you know all this?

The drop is mostly due to high anxiety, full pay striver kids using ED as the new RD to gain an edge.

I think PP meant no other peer school had the same sharp increase in early applications as Duke. Dartmouth was close with 14% but big drop off after that. Duke had a 20% increase in early apps from 4015 to 4855

(Different PP)

This year (class of 2027) still has fewer ED apps than two years ago (class of 2025). It's all relative.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Either the application numbers increased, or Duke decided to accept fewer in the ED round compared to last year, or both.

The question was likely more about why Duke’s rise in applicants was so high this year relative to other schools. Dartmouth announced need blind for internationals this year and they increased by 14% (biggest increase in Ivy League). Duke made no new policy changes and they increased in early apps by 20% compared to last year

Agree that the question is what prompted the increase in apps.

In addition, Duke decided to admit fewer ED this year than last year (800 vs 855), but that factor was completely in Duke's control.

Many top schools (including Harvard) decided to admit less kids in the early round this year, but I’m not sure why

Fewer

👍

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Too many URMs, athletes, legacies and donors' kids to accept.

And people who don’t understand math.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Too many URMs, athletes, legacies and donors' kids to accept.

This would cause the numbers to go up; not down.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Too many URMs, athletes, legacies and donors' kids to accept.

This would cause the numbers to go up; not down.

+1. Also this isn’t unique to Duke. Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, UPenn, and Dartmouth accept many legacy/donor types in the early round too. The key driver is that ED apps to Duke went up by 20%, while peer schools saw nowhere near that type of increase