Anonymous
02/28/2026 08:49
Subject: high schools SHOULD limit kids to 12 college apps.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:The prevailing feeling is that limiting the number of applications will give your child better odds at getting in (i.e. 20% acceptance rate instead of 10%). It doesn’t, even if everyone agrees to the limit. If there are ten thousand seats, no matter how you slice and dice the number of applications, only ten thousand will be admitted.
for good private schools, you're not in a giant pool of thousands. you're in the pool of kids from your high school. it makes a real difference if you're in a pool of 10 from your school or 25.
I agree with this. If you are coming from a top private, a school like Brown will take 1-3 from your high school each and every year. It's almost a guarantee. Now the question becomes whether or not there are 20 kids vying for these spots or 10 or 5. And if you have the valedictorian in the mix then they will end up taking one of these spots but will almost 100% choose HYPS instead.
The whole process is a lot more predictable from a small, top private then coming from a public school. Not entirely so of course but far more so.
More predictable from a small private school but remember that there are hundreds of private schools across the country where the valedictorians may not even be aiming for HYSPM. At a “typical” Southern private, the very top students may be aiming for Duke/Vanderbilt/GA Tech.
Anonymous
02/28/2026 08:44
Subject: high schools SHOULD limit kids to 12 college apps.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:The prevailing feeling is that limiting the number of applications will give your child better odds at getting in (i.e. 20% acceptance rate instead of 10%). It doesn’t, even if everyone agrees to the limit. If there are ten thousand seats, no matter how you slice and dice the number of applications, only ten thousand will be admitted.
for good private schools, you're not in a giant pool of thousands. you're in the pool of kids from your high school. it makes a real difference if you're in a pool of 10 from your school or 25.
I agree with this. If you are coming from a top private, a school like Brown will take 1-3 from your high school each and every year. It's almost a guarantee. Now the question becomes whether or not there are 20 kids vying for these spots or 10 or 5. And if you have the valedictorian in the mix then they will end up taking one of these spots but will almost 100% choose HYPS instead.
The whole process is a lot more predictable from a small, top private then coming from a public school. Not entirely so of course but far more so.
Anonymous
02/27/2026 23:51
Subject: high schools SHOULD limit kids to 12 college apps.
Anonymous wrote:The prevailing feeling is that limiting the number of applications will give your child better odds at getting in (i.e. 20% acceptance rate instead of 10%). It doesn’t, even if everyone agrees to the limit. If there are ten thousand seats, no matter how you slice and dice the number of applications, only ten thousand will be admitted.
for good private schools, you're not in a giant pool of thousands. you're in the pool of kids from your high school. it makes a real difference if you're in a pool of 10 from your school or 25.
Anonymous
02/27/2026 19:29
Subject: high schools SHOULD limit kids to 12 college apps.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:When you are playing the lottery buying more tickets increasing your chance of winning. Since colleges admissions has become analogous to playing the lottery the more applications the greater the chance of winning as well.
this is not how it works though. your peers are your competition. only the very best applicant in the pool has the advantage.
While that is true colleges also are playing the lottery, that best applicant will receive many offers but can only accept one. So colleges can/do yield protect and of course accept more students that will eventually attend.
Game theory with imperfect information on both sides.
Anonymous
02/27/2026 16:24
Subject: Re:high schools SHOULD limit kids to 12 college apps.
And all of this is why schools are filling >50% of their classes ED, and why full-pay and private school students are wise to ED, carefully.
The rest of us will battle for <5% admit rate crumbs in the RD hunger games.
The rest of us will battle for <5% admit rate crumbs in the RD hunger games.
Anonymous
02/27/2026 16:19
Subject: Re:high schools SHOULD limit kids to 12 college apps.
The increase is multi- fold. For kids who are price sensitive but not low income as to receive a free ride, it’s the uncertainty of what merit offers they will receive. For kids who aren’t price sensitive it’s the uncertainty of admission even for safeties if they are high stats. Yield protection, more spots going to FGLI, more spots going to international students, schools looking for proxy indicators to achieve the diversity they want, and students clustering often by gender around a smaller number of majors makes it really impossible to predict where a particular kid will get in and where they won’t.
Anonymous
02/27/2026 15:35
Subject: Re:high schools SHOULD limit kids to 12 college apps.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:The explosion in applications at top-tier schools is being fueled way more by fee-waiver applicants than by full-pay students. In the last few years, the number of aid-seeking applicants at selective and highly-selective schools has grown at triple the rate of full pay applicants.
Part of this is because the common app has made it easier to get fee waivers: In recent years, the number of students using fee waivers actually doubled.
Meanwhile, application numbers from wealthier students are actually pretty flat, year over year. Similar when measured by in terms of applicants whose parents attended college.
The data is pretty clear that your private school full-pay peers are not accounting for most of the increase numbers of applications at prestige-y schools. Rather, the vast majority of the upsurge in application numbers is from applicants who are fee-waiver eligible, first gen, and URM -- by a wide margin.
See the common app annual reports for lots of data backing this up.
So apparently those schools giving away fee-waivers don't mind the influx of applications so what is the problem?
PP here. No problem on my end! I was responding to these folks:
The merit/FA thing is sympathetic but I do t think that’s the driver.
Application numbers are out of control because of prestige chasers, merit chaser/very price conscious, & decision procrastinators
the major reason why students apply broadly is the uncertainty, not the FA.
These are not supported by the data. The data is actually pretty clear that the recent surge in application numbers isn't about "prestige chasing" by full-pay students. It's driven by those who need to compare financial offers, and made possible by reduced barriers to entry.
For those interested, check out Michigan’s HAIL study, in which removing cost uncertainty tripled application rates among low-income students -- without changing admissions standards one iota.
Anonymous
02/27/2026 15:32
Subject: Re:high schools SHOULD limit kids to 12 college apps.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Am I the only one that thinks 12 is a lot? Lol
No. My kid wouldn’t have been able to come up with 12 they were actually willing to attend.
We're in the same boat, which is fine with me. They have good choices and seem happy with several, so I'm not spamming out applications for places they're not really interested in. This seems pretty common - most of their friends applied to 10 or fewer schools, even the ones applying to T20s.
Anonymous
02/27/2026 15:30
Subject: high schools SHOULD limit kids to 12 college apps.
The prevailing feeling is that limiting the number of applications will give your child better odds at getting in (i.e. 20% acceptance rate instead of 10%). It doesn’t, even if everyone agrees to the limit. If there are ten thousand seats, no matter how you slice and dice the number of applications, only ten thousand will be admitted.
Anonymous
02/27/2026 15:14
Subject: high schools SHOULD limit kids to 12 college apps.
I don't think this works unless everyone has the same limit, i.e. public, private, international etc.
Current process lacks transparency, i.e. how many admits are hooked and what hooks, how many spaces in ED, what are the "institutional priorities" and is too random, especially at the top level/selectivity, for this to be reasonable.
Current process lacks transparency, i.e. how many admits are hooked and what hooks, how many spaces in ED, what are the "institutional priorities" and is too random, especially at the top level/selectivity, for this to be reasonable.
Anonymous
02/27/2026 15:13
Subject: Re:high schools SHOULD limit kids to 12 college apps.
Anonymous wrote:The explosion in applications at top-tier schools is being fueled way more by fee-waiver applicants than by full-pay students. In the last few years, the number of aid-seeking applicants at selective and highly-selective schools has grown at triple the rate of full pay applicants.
Part of this is because the common app has made it easier to get fee waivers: In recent years, the number of students using fee waivers actually doubled.
Meanwhile, application numbers from wealthier students are actually pretty flat, year over year. Similar when measured by in terms of applicants whose parents attended college.
The data is pretty clear that your private school full-pay peers are not accounting for most of the increase numbers of applications at prestige-y schools. Rather, the vast majority of the upsurge in application numbers is from applicants who are fee-waiver eligible, first gen, and URM -- by a wide margin.
See the common app annual reports for lots of data backing this up.
So apparently those schools giving away fee-waivers don't mind the influx of applications so what is the problem?
Anonymous
02/27/2026 15:09
Subject: Re:high schools SHOULD limit kids to 12 college apps.
The explosion in applications at top-tier schools is being fueled way more by fee-waiver applicants than by full-pay students. In the last few years, the number of aid-seeking applicants at selective and highly-selective schools has grown at triple the rate of full pay applicants.
Part of this is because the common app has made it easier to get fee waivers: In recent years, the number of students using fee waivers actually doubled.
Meanwhile, application numbers from wealthier students are actually pretty flat, year over year. Similar when measured by in terms of applicants whose parents attended college.
The data is pretty clear that your private school full-pay peers are not accounting for most of the increase numbers of applications at prestige-y schools. Rather, the vast majority of the upsurge in application numbers is from applicants who are fee-waiver eligible, first gen, and URM -- by a wide margin.
See the common app annual reports for lots of data backing this up.
Part of this is because the common app has made it easier to get fee waivers: In recent years, the number of students using fee waivers actually doubled.
Meanwhile, application numbers from wealthier students are actually pretty flat, year over year. Similar when measured by in terms of applicants whose parents attended college.
The data is pretty clear that your private school full-pay peers are not accounting for most of the increase numbers of applications at prestige-y schools. Rather, the vast majority of the upsurge in application numbers is from applicants who are fee-waiver eligible, first gen, and URM -- by a wide margin.
See the common app annual reports for lots of data backing this up.