I was talking about the yield for TJ admits to VT. I made no comment on VT overall yield. 38 TJ grads enrolled at VT last year. This year self-report was 18 (with 25% not reporting), so it looks like yield likely went down. |
Here is the downward trend for TJ students going to Virginia state schools:
179 in 2015 170 in 2016 161 in 2017 140 in 2018 Not all reported for 2019, but trend is toward 130. |
Do TJ student who enroll at VT do so for financial reasons or because of lack of other options, or are there significant other factors in play? The quality of the program certainly hasn't improved (for instance, this year, TJ didn't have a single USACO finalist or USAMO winner). Conversely, what explains the increased acceptance at out-of-state schools? Is it a combination of parent prosperity and declining birth rates, perhaps combined with outsized tuition increases at in-state schools? |
Folks, one-quarter of the class did not report. You can't draw any conclusions with that kind of statistical pool |
From a statistics standpoint that's a huge sample size. The only question would be if it is random. i.e kids going to VT and UVA kids are significantly less likely than kids going to other schools to provide their destination this year. |
VT is the 13th ranked school in engineering. And also all TJ kids are there for engineering. The kids I know who went had other options— but not other options worth multiples of the cost to get the 9th ranked engineering program instead of the 13th. |
So if the self-reporting is accurate, it is interesting why VT is way down this year. Self reported was only 16 (not 18) with 25% not reported vs 38 last year and 42 the year before. |
I can only tell you why my kid did not choose VT (kid drove there on the admitted students' weekend. I did not go nor did I have significant input into kids' impression). 1) (#1 reason): was just not impressed with the student ambassadors. 2) rankings. the #13th ranked school metric (USNWR best undergrad engineering programs) is often quoted here but when you look at the methodology (peer review consisting of 2 surveys asking for a rank from 1-5) that's simply just surveymonkey. VT is not highly ranked on other rankings: QS, THE, Shanghai. Neither is UVA for that matter but at least UVA ranks highly on the main USNWR 3) outcomes. looked at hiring/salary/specific company outcomes for VT as compared to flagships such as UVA/GaTech/UMich/UIUC/Purdue and there was a difference. 4) previous years incoming class profile e.g significantly lower SATs/GPAs/top 10% than flagships. Of course, I understand this is not an apples-to-apples comparison e.g. VT vs UMich/GaTech Felt that VT had a beautiful campus. In a nutshell, thought that VT was a good school but not a compelling destination. |
TJ has 1820 students. If it graduated 485, then with a 25% non-report, that means 120 students did not report. You cannot draw any conclusions from that. |
https://www.qualtrics.com/blog/calculating-sample-size/ |
425 graduated, 340 reported, so 80% of the graduates reported. |
Interesting, and makes sense, except part (1) is a bit silly unless other schools had TJ grads at their ambassadors (did they?). Most ambassadors at VT are probably graduates from NoVA high schools. Curiosity: by what factor does the quoted price tag of attendance differ for UVA/GaTech/UMich/UIUC/Purdue assuming a typical family that doesn't qualify for any discounts? |
My TJ kid isn't going to VT (and didn't apply), but we know several kids who are. All were swayed with the price differential between VT and OOS engineering schools. Also know kids going OOS engineering and it's a mix as to full pay and merit aide. Most folks DO consider pricing when making these decisions. |
As long as the self reports are random, the +/- interval is about 3% with 99% confidence. |
You are probably right on the USNWR engineering rankings, but note that the USNWR undergraduate ranking also has had inputs from counselors and administrators that are pretty much the same as surveying engineering school deans. Most probably don't really know much. |