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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]You need to determine reaches, matches, and safeties on your own.

For grades, you can try to do some comparison by looking at your high school's Naviance scattergrams for particular colleges. Look at both weighted and unweighted GPAs. (Score info from these scattergrams is less useful now that most colleges are test optional, because you cannot tell whether the score for a particular data point was submitted or not.)

For scores, I would use the last year before test-optional policies became widespread. That would be college class of 2024, for which admission data is included in Common Data Set 2020-2021. You can usually find Common Data Sets for each year posted on the college's website, though not all colleges post their CDS.

Determining reaches, matches, and safeties is about more than matching the student's stats to the school; you also must consider acceptance rate. Find the most recent acceptance rate somewhere on the college's admission website, for college class of 2026, or see if it's listed here: https://www.collegekickstart.com/blog/item/class-of-2026-admission-results.

There is some disagreement on how to use acceptance rates for determining reaches, matches, and safeties. For a high-stats student: schools with acceptance rates &lt;30% = reach, 30%-60% = match/target, &gt;60% = safety.  If the student does not have high stats (e.g. scores over the school's 75th percentile), then you need to adjust accordingly.

Honestly, under test optional policies, the uncertainty is simply greater than it was under the old test-required scenario, and this makes categorizing reaches, matches, and safeties that much more difficult. There is wisdom in a more conservative approach: have more targets and safeties than would have seemed necessary in the past.[/quote]

Yes to all the advice here. In addition to Naviance and really looking at Common Data, I used this site https://www.bigjeducationalconsulting.com/resources to see the ED vs RD admission rates and how much a class is filled ED.  A school could be a target if applying ED and a reach if applying RD.

For the most part, my child was admitted to colleges that matched their stats. Though it felt a little like reading the tea leaves to determine what was a true safety and match. It was a combination of how the student compares to other kids from their school applying to the college historically speaking and the track record of their school with that college. It’s also what the college says is very important, important, and considered (it’s in CDS and also Naviance) and if your child has a strength/edge in those categories.  So if an interview is important and challenging coursework is important, if your child doesn’t interview and doesn’t take honors and AP that lowers the chances of getting in even if they had the same unweighted GPA as someone else. It’s also evaluating if there is a geographical or financial (need aware vs need blind) advantage for your child given the college and what is the the acceptance rate for the applicant pool your child is in I.e. ED, EA or RD.  Finally, if applying to a special program or competitive major that can also change a safety vs target.  So for example, if my child applies to Syracuse ED to major in history that may be a match but applying RD to the marquee program within Newome - that might be a reach.[/quote]

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