Most selective R1 universities by acceptance rate

[Anonymous]

In 1980 UCLA had an admission rate of 75%.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Most the top schools with ED (not EA) are filling approximately 50 percent their slots using ED since it’s binding (yield rate in the upper 90s…exception is financial reasons for not going). The remaining is filled via ED2 (if they offer) and RD. Less applications in ED vs RD with roughly the same number of spots to fill but ED has higher yield rate so RD even though more applicants will have more acceptances than ED bc of the lower yield rate.

I don't think people understand how impactful athletic recruits are at some of these schools. Sure, Princeton doesn't have a binding ED, but they have EA. There are approximately 1,000 athletes/students at Princeton spread across 38 varsity sports. There are approximately 5,600 undergrads, and about 1,350 freshmen enroll each year. So almost 20% of those slots are taken out of the general pool in any given year. There really are only 1,100 non-athletic spots open for admissions. Who knows how many are reserved for donors, URM's, etc. When you get into the granular level, now you see why even the perfect straight A, high SAT student has to apply to all the ivies, and the JHU's, G'town's, Emory, NEU's, Vandy's.

So you’re assuming that all 1000 of those athletes are recruited? Yeah, no.

[Anonymous]

Interesting that Georgetown, which doesn't have ED or ED2 and is not test optional and is not on the common app, is not on this list.

[Anonymous]

Agree it should be. It’s equal to a Hopkins at a minimum from and undergrad perspective but way better career placement. Their EA acceptance rate was under 10 percent with their A&S being under 5 percent. Their outplacement to top jobs is strong along with law and medical school placement. IMO the cache schools have on campus recruiting from the top 3 management consulting (McKinsey, Bain, BCG) and financial industry (Goldman, JP Morgan) are strong indicators of a strong school with name brand appeal. Some will say it’s a ridiculous measure but if those companies aren’t conducting on campus recruiting with dedicated recruitment teams, it’s not a name brand school. https://careercenter.georgetown.edu/about-us/senior-survey-outcomes/

Example Hopkins McKinsey recruiting vs Georgetown for undergrad. Their recruitment team differences make it clear what undergrad institute they prefer.

https://www.mckinsey.com/Careers/Students/Undergraduate-Degree-Candidates/Johns-Hopkins-University

https://www.mckinsey.com/Careers/Students/Undergraduate-Degree-Candidates/Georgetown-University

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Northeastern number is really sus

It has no business being in the same range as Princeton, Penn, Vanderbilt, Rice, Northwestern.

I don't know what voodoo magic that school is doing. It was a commuter school for cops from Revere twenty years ago.

Emphasis on was. It's a top research school now and has a great CS program (and other great programs as well). Why you bring up what was every time NEU is mentioned is beyond me. 96,000+ applications last year, and probably more this year, make it a hot school no matter that you seem to bash them every time their name comes up

+1

DP:

It's a good school, in a hot college town (Boston is a great college town), with no supplemental essays (so it's an easy application---just pay your fee and hit submit in the Common App) and NEU has marketed well to get those application numbers up. Key is they are in Boston and no supplementals.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Main reason for ED is yield not lowering acceptance rate.

If ED acceptance rate is high, it discourages applicants for RD, thus it negatively affect acceptance rate, too.

For whatever reason, even the schools offering double rounds of ED get more applications. Truly I don't understand why.

Because majority who ED somewhere also have an ED2 in mind in case they are not accepted. Kids want to take advantage of the "higher acceptance rates" with ED1/2 and the universities want to guarantee yield so offer ED2 to capture those with money who can afford to ED but didn't get an acceptance with eD1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You would think that the schools having ED1 and ED2 would discourage many RD applicants from applying.

But I looked it up. Every single one received more applications last year than the year before.

But isn’t basically every school getting more applications? More kids, more kids going to college, and more anxiety about low admissions rates all leads to a lot more applications.

The ED and EA stuff is genius for the schools thought — Pitt gets a ton of applications mainly because kids want to have one in the pocket before holidays. I think northeastern also benefits from this. It’s also crazy to me how all the college counselors suggest northeastern — it’s so rampant I’d suspect kickbacks except that I think it’s more just that 5 years ago it was a good safety/target but they’ve overhyped it so much that the admit rate is now really low.

It’s all just a crazy irrational market that is totally non transparent and filled with under informed consumers (through no fault of their own — it’s just impossible to really know what you’re buying). The med school match system might make more sense -/ I don’t know.

My kid got in ED to top choice but I am not looking forward to doing this insanity again in 3 years.

pitt is genius with their rolling admissions. It benefits them greatly! Everyone wants a strong Safety/target acceptance in hand early on, especially for kids in STEM. I'm sure it makes yield management an issue, but it gives them a strong group of applications from which to select

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Interesting that Georgetown, which doesn't have ED or ED2 and is not test optional and is not on the common app, is not on this list.

The question becomes, are schools more apt to continue down the road of ED1 and ED2, or the route that Georgetown takes? In a sense, Georgetown is able to stand out because it stands alone. But for every G'town, you have a Johns Hopkins, Chicago, NEU, Emory, etc. When we toured Emory, the admission's officer giving the presentation was really coy about its admission statistics for its Oxford campus. A lot of kids got rejected from Emory Atlanta but offered Oxford. That boosts Emory's selectivity rates. I really don't have a problem with a school that markets. My child received mailers from Chicago even though she did nothing to indicate that she was going to apply there. I don't think the mailers was some kind of con game.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Interesting that Georgetown, which doesn't have ED or ED2 and is not test optional and is not on the common app, is not on this list.

The question becomes, are schools more apt to continue down the road of ED1 and ED2, or the route that Georgetown takes? In a sense, Georgetown is able to stand out because it stands alone. But for every G'town, you have a Johns Hopkins, Chicago, NEU, Emory, etc. When we toured Emory, the admission's officer giving the presentation was really coy about its admission statistics for its Oxford campus. A lot of kids got rejected from Emory Atlanta but offered Oxford. That boosts Emory's selectivity rates. I really don't have a problem with a school that markets. My child received mailers from Chicago even though she did nothing to indicate that she was going to apply there. I don't think the mailers was some kind of con game.

My child got mailers from a hundred different colleges. Even one from the UK. It is just advertising.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In 1980 UCLA had an admission rate of 75%.

Voodoo magic

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The Northeastern number is really sus

It has no business being in the same range as Princeton, Penn, Vanderbilt, Rice, Northwestern.

I don't know what voodoo magic that school is doing. It was a commuter school for cops from Revere twenty years ago.

Emphasis on was. It's a top research school now and has a great CS program (and other great programs as well). Why you bring up what was every time NEU is mentioned is beyond me. 96,000+ applications last year, and probably more this year, make it a hot school no matter that you seem to bash them every time their name comes up

+1

DP:

It's a good school, in a hot college town (Boston is a great college town), with no supplemental essays (so it's an easy application---just pay your fee and hit submit in the Common App) and NEU has marketed well to get those application numbers up. Key is they are in Boston and no supplementals.

Another similarly ranked good school, Case Western, has no supplements, but it's not as popular. There's a school called Wentworth Institute of Tech with no supplements literally right next to NEU, but it's not popular at all. Thus, it tells us that it's not Boston and/or no supplements. It's a combination of many things.

I personally think the key is outcomes. NEU's outcomes rival those of many elite schools mentioned above, such as Rice, Vanderbilt, UChicago, Brown, Northwestern, etc.

Also, the purpose of supplements is to pick the right student for the school. NEU is doing one of the best jobs based on the retention rate, which is in the top 5. Its graduation rate is also in the top 25-30 among national universities. I think more schools should follow NEU's example and reduce the burden on students. Schools should have plenty of information already.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Interesting that Georgetown, which doesn't have ED or ED2 and is not test optional and is not on the common app, is not on this list.

Two things: Covid boosted everyone's application amount. Sure, going test optional boosted it further. But what I think also happened is that those schools who have a STEM/engineering/comp sci focus really saw the biggest increase. Schools like CMU and NEU saw a much bigger jump in applications than Georgetown and Emory.

I'm not saying that Georgetown and Emory don't have good STEM programs, but their focus is elsewhere. To illustrate:

Georgetown
SAT (2019-2020)
25%-75%
1370-1530
Total apps: 22,764

SAT (2022-2023)
25%-75%
1410-1540
Total apps: 26,638

17% increase in applications

Emory
SAT (2019-2020) Pre-Covid
25%-75%
1390-1510
Total apps: 30,017


SAT (2022-2023) Post-Covid/test optional
25%-75%
1450-1530
Total apps: 33,179
11% increase in applications

NEU
SAT (2019-2020) Pre-Covid
25%-75%
1390-1540
Total apps: 62,263

SAT (2022-2023) Post-Covid/test optional
25%-75%
1450-1540
Total apps: 91,000

46% increase in applications

Carnegie Mellon
SAT (2019-2020)
25%-75%
Total apps 27,634

SAT (2022-2023)
25%-75%
1500-1560
Total apps: 34,261

24% increase in applications

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Wrong. It is implicates both. The more slots that are filled ED (and especially EDI and EDII), the fewer slots available in RD. By definition fewer the applicants accepted, the fewer spots to be had.

Exactly.

It's misleading to include ED and non-ED schools in this comparison.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:UPenn and those schools used to have 70% acceptance rates. UPenn and ivies invented ED and all sorts of tactics aka voodoo magic

In the 1950s. None of this is remotely new.

[Anonymous]

Why R1 and not R2 and LACS? Seems silly.

Anonymous wrote:UChicago, Johns Hopkins, Northeastern, Vanderbilt, Tufts, Carnegie Mellon and Emory appear to be the most manipulative when it comes to admissions gamesmanship. Never underestimate how offering EDI and EDII really does depress acceptance rates. A good percentage of the freshman class is already selected by the time regular decision rolls around.

1)California Institute of Technology 4% REA
2)Harvard University 4% REA
3)Columbia University 4% ED
4)Massachusetts Institute of Technology 4% EA
5)Stanford University 4% EA
6)Brown University 5% ED
7)University of Chicago 5% EA, EDI, EDII
8)Yale University 5% REA
9)Dartmouth College 6% ED
10)Duke University 6% ED
11)Princeton University REA
12)Cornell University 7% ED
13)Johns Hopkins University 7% EDI, EDII
14)Northeastern University 7% EA, EDI, EDII
15)Northwestern University 7% ED
16)University of Pennsylvania 7% ED
17)Vanderbilt University 7% EDI, EDII
18)Rice University Houston, TX 9% ED
19)University of California, Los Angeles 9%
20)Tufts University 10% EDI, EDII
21)Carnegie Mellon University 11% EDI, EDII
22)Emory University 11% EDI, EDII