If your flagship had auto-admit for top 6%

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

UT Austin is a great academic institution. This rule gives people a chance who otherwise wouldn’t wouldn’t be admitted.

I don't understand what you are trying to say? Highly qualified TJ and other students applied ED/EA to VT and UVA and got passed over for first-generation kids. How does your sentence comport with that? These are students that in a normal year have superb credentials that according to SCHEV should have been shoo-ins for Virginia Tech. And they did apply early. What are you trying to say about "VaTech didn't hold a position for them". UVA and VT never hold a position for anyone.

Of course this shows an assumption that the first gen kid wasn’t competitive, too. What if they were both equally qualified?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was really shocked coming from the DMV to the Midwest and finding out all kids who had at least a 3.0 in high school got auto admitted to all the universities in the state. Not only that, but they had massive tuition scholarships for kids with a 3.5 and up. It seemed so much more civilized than the crazy competitive atmosphere of Maryland and Virginia public universities.

Yes buts lots of those schools aren’t great.

What states are we talking about here?

Minnesota, Wisconsin, UIUC are all top schools. I don't think they have guaranteed admissions for 3.0+ GPA though, that would be ridiculous. They do tend to have lower GPA and SAT requirements than UMD for freshman despite being peer schools.

Think North Dakota, but not North Dakota.

It's not about the quality of the schools, but our rights as taxpayers. We subsidize public education with our tax dollars. Why shouldn't our kids have #1 priority to go to places like UVa? why do we accept admissions offices turning a right into a privilege?

+ 1. We subsidize "non-profit" Private schools (e.g. the Ivies) as well, yet put up with their secretive selection processes. Why not tax them all? For the benefit of the poster that shows up asking "what about other non-profits like churches and hospitals (imagine a whiny Karen voice here) - yes, tax everyone.

I was actually hearing your post in a whiny Karen voice. Have some self awareness.

Since I wasn't anywhere near you, it must have been your inner voice..

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was really shocked coming from the DMV to the Midwest and finding out all kids who had at least a 3.0 in high school got auto admitted to all the universities in the state. Not only that, but they had massive tuition scholarships for kids with a 3.5 and up. It seemed so much more civilized than the crazy competitive atmosphere of Maryland and Virginia public universities.

Yes buts lots of those schools aren’t great.

What states are we talking about here?

Minnesota, Wisconsin, UIUC are all top schools. I don't think they have guaranteed admissions for 3.0+ GPA though, that would be ridiculous. They do tend to have lower GPA and SAT requirements than UMD for freshman despite being peer schools.

Think North Dakota, but not North Dakota.

It's not about the quality of the schools, but our rights as taxpayers. We subsidize public education with our tax dollars. Why shouldn't our kids have #1 priority to go to places like UVa? why do we accept admissions offices turning a right into a privilege?

+ 1. We subsidize "non-profit" Private schools (e.g. the Ivies) as well, yet put up with their secretive selection processes. Why not tax them all? For the benefit of the poster that shows up asking "what about other non-profits like churches and hospitals (imagine a whiny Karen voice here) - yes, tax everyone.

Thanks for saving me the work! Can you provide me to your other posts in other forums that insist we tax churches and country clubs? Oh, you can't? Because there are none? Because you are full of shit?

NP - golf clubs are taxed. https://www.thegolfbusiness.co.uk/2017/11/taxation-in-golf-your-questions-answered/

You posted a lovely article about golf club taxation in the United Kingdom. Not sure how it is relevant. Most Country Clubs are tax exempt in the US: https://www.irs.gov/charities-non-profits/other-non-profits/social-clubs. https://www.thebalancesmb.com/what-is-a-501c7-tax-exempt-social-club-4172019 https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/nonprofit/2013/02/private-country-club-earning-12-million-in-profits-is-tax-exempt.html

You are not good at this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If a state school hopes to be a great academic institution, it cannot take state residents only or set arbitrary cutoffs without attention to actual ability. Doing either greatly limits the pool of high-achieving applicants and saddles the university with expensive mandates to bring poorly performing kids up to speed or boot them out. The much better approach is what Virginia does: offer a variety of public schools focused on different studies and for students of different abilities and let them compete for which school fits them. By definition, not everyone will go to UVA, or W&M, or VATech, and that is Ok.

This year, everyone wants to complain about UVA and VATech admissions because this was a very unpredictable admissions cycle, and now, many yearn for a quality education at a good price. But, if students and parents really valued these institutions, they would have committed to them upfront. I have little sympathy for the folks who played the field and now rant that UVA and VATech didn’t hold a position for them. Truly the epitome of privileged thinking.

UT Austin seems to be doing just fine

It is, but if it was released from the top 6% rule, it would likely have significantly higher average standardized test scores, probably at around the level of Michigan, etc. Having lived in Texas for a while, they don't seem to be as obsessed with USNWR ranking as DCUM is. They are cognizant that UT Austin is a great deal with in state tuition, and particularly so in areas like business, engineering, and computer science.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If a state school hopes to be a great academic institution, it cannot take state residents only or set arbitrary cutoffs without attention to actual ability. Doing either greatly limits the pool of high-achieving applicants and saddles the university with expensive mandates to bring poorly performing kids up to speed or boot them out. The much better approach is what Virginia does: offer a variety of public schools focused on different studies and for students of different abilities and let them compete for which school fits them. By definition, not everyone will go to UVA, or W&M, or VATech, and that is Ok.

This year, everyone wants to complain about UVA and VATech admissions because this was a very unpredictable admissions cycle, and now, many yearn for a quality education at a good price. But, if students and parents really valued these institutions, they would have committed to them upfront. I have little sympathy for the folks who played the field and now rant that UVA and VATech didn’t hold a position for them. Truly the epitome of privileged thinking.

UT Austin seems to be doing just fine

It is, but if it was released from the top 6% rule, it would likely have significantly higher average standardized test scores, probably at around the level of Michigan, etc. Having lived in Texas for a while, they don't seem to be as obsessed with USNWR ranking as DCUM is. They are cognizant that UT Austin is a great deal with in state tuition, and particularly so in areas like business, engineering, and computer science.

I’m confused. Are you saying that high hs junior level SAT scores make a college a great academic institution? Did you even listen to the podcast?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So is higher education a right or a reward based upon merit. I am seeing both ideas expressed here.

And for those saying it is a "right," where does Texas' approach leave the other 94% of graduates?

At one of the other many state universities. The 6% rule is only for UT Austin. There are 8 colleges in the UT system and 11 in the Texas A&M system. The UT system has been making a large investment in the non-Austin schools to make them more attractive.

Also, the top 6% represent 75% of the freshman class at UT Austin. They use a holistic application process for the remaining 25%.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m from Texas and a UT grad (2014). The rule used to be the top 10% but the state dropped it be more competitive. The main issue is that the top 6% vary widely by school/ district. For example, I went to a large Dallas high school that had 1400 seniors in my graduating class, the top 6% all had a GPA well over 4.5 (weighted). If you didn’t take the max number of APs and opt out of certain electives that had a lower value you would never make it to the top 6%. However, my suite mate freshman year was from the Rio Grande Valley and went to a high school where being in the top 6% meant a GPA of 3.2 or above. That means some students may have to work a lot harder, but that is true everywhere.

I think this also causes these top Texas schools to be safeties for many high ranking students and then there are less admits from lower ranked students in the class since spots were “full” for that school/ district.

I will say GPAs and rankings are nuts. Our top two students were locked in a bitter lawsuit over one thousandths of a decimal point.

it's the fault of the state if they allow to districts to offer massively dissimilar educations. I actually like that a very conservative state is pretending that all districts are equal for the purpose of college admission rather than punishing kids who live in substandard school districts

Yep. It definitely hits the equity mark.
Of course, no one talks about the $%& show that is created when the freshman psychology teacher has the joy of grading on that bell curve where the kid for the Rio Grande Valley is always at the bottom due to this pretense during the admissions phase that all students who were admitted would do equally well. Just make sure these professors know that they are not to discuss their consternation about the disparity on a zoom call that's being recorded or they will risk being fired for pointing out the obvious issues such a policy creates.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m from Texas and a UT grad (2014). The rule used to be the top 10% but the state dropped it be more competitive. The main issue is that the top 6% vary widely by school/ district. For example, I went to a large Dallas high school that had 1400 seniors in my graduating class, the top 6% all had a GPA well over 4.5 (weighted). If you didn’t take the max number of APs and opt out of certain electives that had a lower value you would never make it to the top 6%. However, my suite mate freshman year was from the Rio Grande Valley and went to a high school where being in the top 6% meant a GPA of 3.2 or above. That means some students may have to work a lot harder, but that is true everywhere.

I think this also causes these top Texas schools to be safeties for many high ranking students and then there are less admits from lower ranked students in the class since spots were “full” for that school/ district.

I will say GPAs and rankings are nuts. Our top two students were locked in a bitter lawsuit over one thousandths of a decimal point.

it's the fault of the state if they allow to districts to offer massively dissimilar educations. I actually like that a very conservative state is pretending that all districts are equal for the purpose of college admission rather than punishing kids who live in substandard school districts

I also saw that this led to more than a few anxious white parents transferring to a lower ranked school district for the guaranteed college admission. There are all sorts of ways to game the system!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was really shocked coming from the DMV to the Midwest and finding out all kids who had at least a 3.0 in high school got auto admitted to all the universities in the state. Not only that, but they had massive tuition scholarships for kids with a 3.5 and up. It seemed so much more civilized than the crazy competitive atmosphere of Maryland and Virginia public universities.

Yes buts lots of those schools aren’t great.

What states are we talking about here?

Minnesota, Wisconsin, UIUC are all top schools. I don't think they have guaranteed admissions for 3.0+ GPA though, that would be ridiculous. They do tend to have lower GPA and SAT requirements than UMD for freshman despite being peer schools.

Think North Dakota, but not North Dakota.

It's not about the quality of the schools, but our rights as taxpayers. We subsidize public education with our tax dollars. Why shouldn't our kids have #1 priority to go to places like UVa? why do we accept admissions offices turning a right into a privilege?

+ 1. We subsidize "non-profit" Private schools (e.g. the Ivies) as well, yet put up with their secretive selection processes. Why not tax them all? For the benefit of the poster that shows up asking "what about other non-profits like churches and hospitals (imagine a whiny Karen voice here) - yes, tax everyone.

Thanks for saving me the work! Can you provide me to your other posts in other forums that insist we tax churches and country clubs? Oh, you can't? Because there are none? Because you are full of shit?

NP - golf clubs are taxed. https://www.thegolfbusiness.co.uk/2017/11/taxation-in-golf-your-questions-answered/

You posted a lovely article about golf club taxation in the United Kingdom. Not sure how it is relevant. Most Country Clubs are tax exempt in the US: https://www.irs.gov/charities-non-profits/other-non-profits/social-clubs. https://www.thebalancesmb.com/what-is-a-501c7-tax-exempt-social-club-4172019 https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/nonprofit/2013/02/private-country-club-earning-12-million-in-profits-is-tax-exempt.html

You are not good at this.

The point was that they ARE taxed but in a special category. And country clubs are completely separted from churches which fall under the first amendment. Sorry I'm so busy with my law practice that I couldn't precisely point to the IRS Reg that you were seeking but as you said "I'm not good at this" so I'll ask Yale for my law degree back tomorrow. Hey, a thought for you: instead of being insulting, why don't you research it and announce to the world the difference between golf club and church tax treatment instead of just insulting strangers here? What an idea! Being productive instead of trying to scold and be a karen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If a state school hopes to be a great academic institution, it cannot take state residents only or set arbitrary cutoffs without attention to actual ability. Doing either greatly limits the pool of high-achieving applicants and saddles the university with expensive mandates to bring poorly performing kids up to speed or boot them out. The much better approach is what Virginia does: offer a variety of public schools focused on different studies and for students of different abilities and let them compete for which school fits them. By definition, not everyone will go to UVA, or W&M, or VATech, and that is Ok.

This year, everyone wants to complain about UVA and VATech admissions because this was a very unpredictable admissions cycle, and now, many yearn for a quality education at a good price. But, if students and parents really valued these institutions, they would have committed to them upfront. I have little sympathy for the folks who played the field and now rant that UVA and VATech didn’t hold a position for them. Truly the epitome of privileged thinking.

UT Austin seems to be doing just fine

It is, but if it was released from the top 6% rule, it would likely have significantly higher average standardized test scores, probably at around the level of Michigan, etc. Having lived in Texas for a while, they don't seem to be as obsessed with USNWR ranking as DCUM is. They are cognizant that UT Austin is a great deal with in state tuition, and particularly so in areas like business, engineering, and computer science.

I’m confused. Are you saying that high hs junior level SAT scores make a college a great academic institution? Did you even listen to the podcast?

Top 6%/10% provides opportunities to some people, but it takes them away from others. If you go to an easy high school, you may be top 10% working less than someone who goes to a tougher school with tougher competition.

[Anonymous]

When I graduated HS in AZ, top 5% got a tuition waiver and kept it with a 3.5 GPA.

And in-state tuition was $1600 a year. 1991. The last I checked it had gone up 800%.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

UT Austin is a great academic institution. This rule gives people a chance who otherwise wouldn’t wouldn’t be admitted.

I don't understand what you are trying to say? Highly qualified TJ and other students applied ED/EA to VT and UVA and got passed over for first-generation kids. How does your sentence comport with that? These are students that in a normal year have superb credentials that according to SCHEV should have been shoo-ins for Virginia Tech. And they did apply early. What are you trying to say about "VaTech didn't hold a position for them". UVA and VT never hold a position for anyone.

Of course this shows an assumption that the first gen kid wasn’t competitive, too. What if they were both equally qualified?


No, it doesn't assume that. There are only so many seats. If you have 50,000 applications for only 3750 at UVA and 968 are in via ED and 6,000 are admited EA, and then you are told that of the ED and EA groups, 652 slots went to first-generation, wouldn't you be a little concerned? Especially if you knew that 56% of Americans already in colleges are first-generation (like myself). And predominantly white, so don't make this a race thing.

I think the problem was especially acute at VT from what I read. You had VT kids who had 4.7 GPAs, 36 ACTs, ECs, everything and they were deferred from ED or EA. Meanwhile, they weren't getting in into the top private tech schools either because the test-optional scheme opened the floodgates to record numbers of applications at all the top schools. So, as I read it (I have no affiliation with VT), some VT kids aren't in anywhere. But I still do't understand why the PP said that they thought "VT didn't hold a position for them". VT never holds a position for everyone. It's just we are now going thru a sea change due to covid plus the two presidents of VT and UVA have decided that yet another new speciality group - the first generationers - take precedence.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

UT Austin is a great academic institution. This rule gives people a chance who otherwise wouldn’t wouldn’t be admitted.

I don't understand what you are trying to say? Highly qualified TJ and other students applied ED/EA to VT and UVA and got passed over for first-generation kids. How does your sentence comport with that? These are students that in a normal year have superb credentials that according to SCHEV should have been shoo-ins for Virginia Tech. And they did apply early. What are you trying to say about "VaTech didn't hold a position for them". UVA and VT never hold a position for anyone.

Of course this shows an assumption that the first gen kid wasn’t competitive, too. What if they were both equally qualified?

No, it doesn't assume that. There are only so many seats. If you have 50,000 applications for only 3750 at UVA and 968 are in via ED and 6,000 are admited EA, and then you are told that of the ED and EA groups, 652 slots went to first-generation, wouldn't you be a little concerned? Especially if you knew that 56% of Americans already in colleges are first-generation (like myself). And predominantly white, so don't make this a race thing.

I think the problem was especially acute at VT from what I read. You had VT kids who had 4.7 GPAs, 36 ACTs, ECs, everything and they were deferred from ED or EA. Meanwhile, they weren't getting in into the top private tech schools either because the test-optional scheme opened the floodgates to record numbers of applications at all the top schools. So, as I read it (I have no affiliation with VT), some VT kids aren't in anywhere. But I still do't understand why the PP said that they thought "VT didn't hold a position for them". VT never holds a position for everyone. It's just we are now going thru a sea change due to covid plus the two presidents of VT and UVA have decided that yet another new speciality group - the first generationers - take precedence.

VT? TJ?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m from Texas and a UT grad (2014). The rule used to be the top 10% but the state dropped it be more competitive. The main issue is that the top 6% vary widely by school/ district. For example, I went to a large Dallas high school that had 1400 seniors in my graduating class, the top 6% all had a GPA well over 4.5 (weighted). If you didn’t take the max number of APs and opt out of certain electives that had a lower value you would never make it to the top 6%. However, my suite mate freshman year was from the Rio Grande Valley and went to a high school where being in the top 6% meant a GPA of 3.2 or above. That means some students may have to work a lot harder, but that is true everywhere.

I think this also causes these top Texas schools to be safeties for many high ranking students and then there are less admits from lower ranked students in the class since spots were “full” for that school/ district.

I will say GPAs and rankings are nuts. Our top two students were locked in a bitter lawsuit over one thousandths of a decimal point.

it's the fault of the state if they allow to districts to offer massively dissimilar educations. I actually like that a very conservative state is pretending that all districts are equal for the purpose of college admission rather than punishing kids who live in substandard school districts

Yep. It definitely hits the equity mark.
Of course, no one talks about the $%& show that is created when the freshman psychology teacher has the joy of grading on that bell curve where the kid for the Rio Grande Valley is always at the bottom due to this pretense during the admissions phase that all students who were admitted would do equally well. Just make sure these professors know that they are not to discuss their consternation about the disparity on a zoom call that's being recorded or they will risk being fired for pointing out the obvious issues such a policy creates.

Did you listen to the podcast?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If a state school hopes to be a great academic institution, it cannot take state residents only or set arbitrary cutoffs without attention to actual ability. Doing either greatly limits the pool of high-achieving applicants and saddles the university with expensive mandates to bring poorly performing kids up to speed or boot them out. The much better approach is what Virginia does: offer a variety of public schools focused on different studies and for students of different abilities and let them compete for which school fits them. By definition, not everyone will go to UVA, or W&M, or VATech, and that is Ok.

This year, everyone wants to complain about UVA and VATech admissions because this was a very unpredictable admissions cycle, and now, many yearn for a quality education at a good price. But, if students and parents really valued these institutions, they would have committed to them upfront. I have little sympathy for the folks who played the field and now rant that UVA and VATech didn’t hold a position for them. Truly the epitome of privileged thinking.

UT Austin seems to be doing just fine

It is, but if it was released from the top 6% rule, it would likely have significantly higher average standardized test scores, probably at around the level of Michigan, etc. Having lived in Texas for a while, they don't seem to be as obsessed with USNWR ranking as DCUM is. They are cognizant that UT Austin is a great deal with in state tuition, and particularly so in areas like business, engineering, and computer science.

I’m confused. Are you saying that high hs junior level SAT scores make a college a great academic institution? Did you even listen to the podcast?

Top 6%/10% provides opportunities to some people, but it takes them away from others. If you go to an easy high school, you may be top 10% working less than someone who goes to a tougher school with tougher competition.

Those at the high schools with tougher competition usually have other advantages in life that those in the “easier” high schools do not. Please don’t assume that people in the easier high schools aren’t working hard. They often have other obstacles to success. And if you understand equity would understand this is what is needed.

This policy was put in place as an alternative to affirmative action because UT lost a court case - Hopwood.