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Ivy League Admission
The Ivy Coach College Admissions Blog

2017 Ivy League Admissions Statistics

May 16, 2013
Ivy League Admissions Stats, 2017 Ivy League Admissions Stats, 2017 Ivy League Statistics

We’ve got the most comprehensive analysis of the 2017 Ivy League Admissions Statistics on the web.

Looking for the most comprehensive 2017 Ivy League Admissions Statistics on the web replete with analysis for each of the eight institutions? We’ve got this for you. Curious which of the eight universities had the highest number of Early applications? That would be Harvard University with 4,856 Early Action applications, edging out the University of Pennsylvania which had 4,812 Early Decision applications. Curious which of the Ancient Eight universities received the highest number of total applications? That distinction does not belong to Harvard University but rather to Cornell University. Cornell had 40,006 applications this year for the Class of 2017. Harvard had 35,023, placing second in this particular category.

And which university among the Ivies received the highest number of Regular Decision applications? The winner is…Cornell University again with 35,813 applications. Finishing second to Cornell in this category is Columbia University, with 30,405 applications received. Columbia edged out Harvard, which received 30,167 Regular Decision applications. Curious which university had the largest chunk of their admitted class filled in the Early round? That would be (of course)…the University of Pennsylvania. If you want to go to Penn, it’s always best to apply Early Decision. They want to be loved. Penn filled 49.4% of its class through Early Decision. Columbia filled 43.2% of its class through Early Decision. And Dartmouth College filled 41.4% of its class through Early Decision.

Have a question for us on the 2017 Ivy League Admissions Statistics? Want to know more about the breakdown of the admitted Ivy League classes? Check out our Ivy League Statistics pages or send us your questions by writing a comment below. We look forward to hearing from you.

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Asian American Parents and Ivy League

May 15, 2013
Asians and Ivy League, Asian Parents and College Admission, Asian American Parents and College Admissions

Asian American parents are, quite often, obsessed with the Ivy League colleges, Stanford, MIT, and a couple of other universities (photo credit: Jawed Karim).

Asian and Asian American parents have a special affinity for the Ivy League. If you’re a regular reader of our college admissions blog, you know that we’re often very critical of statements and articles about the highly selective college admissions process in the press. We’re critical because there is an enormity of inaccurate information out there about this process and we aim to correct this. Today, we came across an article by lawyer and author Allison Singh (who also notes that she was a rejected college applicant in spite of the fact that she ended up attending one of the finest — if not the finest — university in the nation) that is not in the least inaccurate. While this may come as a surprise to many, we have only praise for this May 14th piece on “The Huffington Post” entitled “College Admissions and the Asian-American Parent.”

In the piece, Ms. Singh discusses how Asian American parents are all basically culprits of using “The List.” “The List” consists of “The Ivies, MIT, Stanford, Caltech, Berkeley. Maybe Duke, if all else fails…maybe.” We would add a couple of other schools (have you ever walked around UCLA?) but Ms. Singh is spot on. Chinese American parents — and even more so parents in China whose children will be attending university in the United States, rarely stray from “The List.” They are obsessed with brand recognition and they consider the “US News & World Report” rankings “The Bible.” It’s all about status, as Ms. Singh writes.

Are there Asian and Asian American students at highly selective liberal arts colleges like Williams College, Amherst College, and Wesleyan University? Sure. But these universities aren’t on the same playing field for this group of parents, unfortunately. Amherst College — in spite of offering one of the greatest educations in the world — just doesn’t make “The List.” It’s not Harvard. It’s not MIT. The fact is that brand recognition matters. Universities invest millions to build their brands. They employ folks just to bolster their brands. The day that Asian and Asian American parents stray from “The List” is a day we don’t foresee happening anytime soon, though our Asian and Asian American clients always stray a little (though they quite often also apply to “The List” schools too).

Categories: College Admissions, Ivy League, Parents Tags: , , , ,
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Recruiting Unqualified College Applicants

May 14, 2013

There is an article in “The Chronicle of Higher Education” by Jon Boeckenstedt, the associate vice president for enrollment management at De Paul University, entitled “Let’s Bring Clarity to Undergraduate Admissions” which discusses how the current college admissions system is broken and in need of a fix. What we found most interesting in Mr. Boeckenstedt’s article is the following comment on colleges recruiting unqualified college applicants: “Occasionally colleges knowingly send materials to students who have almost no chance of being admitted. In what can only be called a disgrace to higher education, the students serve an important role in catering to the sub-industry that creates rewards and incentives for rejecting the largest percentage of applicants.”

Recruiting Unqualified University Applicants, Unqualified University Applicants, Recruiting College Applicants

Highly selective universities need to stop recruiting unqualified college applicants. This practice is unethical.

Well said, Mr. Boeckenstedt. It’s something we’ve been writing about for years and the more folks in the college admissions community that put this in writing, the better. The only thing we would correct in this statement is the usage of the word “occasionally.” Mr. Boeckenstedt is being too nice. Highly selective colleges don’t “occasionally” send recruiting materials to students who have zero shot of ever gaining admission (simply to boost their application numbers and thereby lower their admission rate). They do it every year in droves. Highly selective colleges send brochures to students whose SAT scores fall well below their mean SAT score, knowing full well that student has no shot of getting in. They do this only to boost their “US News & World Report” ranking. It’s ridiculous. A few colleges have taken a stand and said we’re not doing this anymore. We’ve highlighted a couple of these colleges in the past, but these colleges are the exception to the rule, not the rule.

Highly selective colleges need to show more empathy to seventeen year-old high school students going through a very stressful time in their lives. They shouldn’t be getting the hopes up of these students who, in reality, have no shot of ever getting in to their institution. It’s wrong. It’s unethical. Thank you to Mr. Boeckenstedt for drawing attention to this practice. And remember, just because you receive brochures from a college, that doesn’t mean that college actually thinks you can get in. It merely means they want you to apply. They want anyone to apply. Heck, they even get an application fee with each application. It’s a business with a bottom line.

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Getting Off A College Waitlist

May 13, 2013
Get Off University Waiting List, Get Off College Waiting Lists, Get Off A Waitlist

You don’t need to start a Twitter campaign to get off a college waitlist (photo credit: Eric Chan from Palo Alto, CA).

It’s college waitlist season so we thought we’d share with you a story about a student’s attempts at getting off a college waitlist. Are you trying to devise a creative way to stand out so that admissions officers will pluck you from dreaded college admissions limbo? We recommend that you simply write an extremely well crafted letter of enthusiasm and update colleges on any significant new achievement (with strong emphasis on the word significant). But some students do different things and, sometimes, they work. More often, they don’t. We do not recommend starting a Twitter campaign to engage the college that has waitlisted you but for one Massachusetts resident, it seems to have worked. While the school stated that the Twitter campaign did not influence Bernie Zak’s admissions decision to UCLA, Zak believes it did.

Zak wrote a series of Tweets directed to the UCLA office of admissions, including a list of reasons why the university in Westwood Village should admit the high school senior. Such reasons included tidbits like UCLA could use a 5’8 center. Funny. Kind of. Or how they could use him as a practice pitcher on their baseball team since he played high school baseball. Or how they’d be admitting a future President of the United States. Uh huh. And how he looks like David Hasselhoff when he runs down the Santa Monica beach. Ok there. Anyhow, the Twitter campaign attracted enough attention that UCLA’s student newspaper wrote about the waitlisted student and, yes, it did come to the attention of UCLA admissions officers. According to an article in “The Boston Globe,” “[UCLA spokesman Richard] Vazquez said the university was aware of the Zak family’s campaign, but he added: ‘A Twitter campaign by any student would have absolutely no influence on our admittance ­decision.’”

Zak is very glad that he decided to market himself to UCLA over Twitter and even says he has a couple of friends who wish they’d thought of that idea. We can assure you that it’s not a great idea to start a Twitter campaign to try to get off a college waitlist. A really well crafted letter would have done the trick in all likelihood for Mr. Zak, since he was able to gain admission off the waitlist and earn admission to the UCLA Class of 2017.

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University Waitlists

May 12, 2013
College Waiting List, University Waiting List, University Waitlisted Students

There are certainly things you should not do when on university waitlists. Parents should not call admissions offices.

We wanted to discuss more things you should never do when on university waitlists as the piece by Ariel Kaminer in “The New York Times” entitled “On a College Waiting List? Sending Cookies Isn’t Going to Help” is filled with quite a few gems that are deserving of further exploration. As the piece states, trying to get off a college waitlist is kind of like dating (not long-term dating, just the first couple of dates kind of dating). You should express interest but not to an extreme level and there’s nothing wrong with expressing interest to a few different colleges (though colleges can try to gauge this, too). You should not do nothing. Doing nothing will not get you off that waitlist in all likelihood. You’ve got a much better shot if you play your cards the right way.

And playing your cards the right way should by no means involve parents calling the admissions office. According to “The New York Times” article, “‘There’s a mother who e-mails me every third day — they must have timers on these things,’ Ms. [Ann Fleming' Brown [, the director of admissions at Union College,] said. ‘There’s one parent who calls up and yells at me: ‘I can’t believe this happened! This is a horrible thing!’ And then he calls 10 minutes later and says, ‘I’m sorry.’ Then he calls and says, ‘I know you don’t like me. I’m being a complete pest.’” Talk about things not to do! Ever.

Writing notes like, “I love you, I love you, I love you” also doesn’t do the trick, as stated in the piece. A college is not your junior high girlfriend. Colleges are, as the article states, “academic institutions.” You don’t write childish love letters to academic institutions. You do, however, write a strongly worded and articulately crafted letter about why you still want to attend an institution and what you can add to that university’s student body that they don’t already have. Discuss classes, discuss research opportunities, extracurriculars, and what sets you apart in this world. That’s the key to trying to navigate getting off that dreaded university waitlist.

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College Waiting Lists

May 11, 2013
College Waitlists, Waiting Lists for Colleges, University Waitlists

Are you stuck on college waiting lists? The key is not to do nothing. And it’s also not to send baked goods.

Stuck on college waiting lists? There is an article in today’s “New York Times” by Ariel Kaminer entitled, “On a College Waiting List? Sending Cookies Isn’t Going to Help.” Well, that’s for sure! It never ceases to amaze us how many waitlisted college applicants think it wise to nonetheless send baked goods to offices of admission each and every year. Will the admissions officers eat the cookies? Often times — indeed. Will the cookies positively impact their candidacy and chances of getting off the waitlist? No way! Seriously, did you really think baked goods would do the trick?

In the article in “The New York Times,” sending “family photos, craft projects depicting campus landmarks and dossiers of testimonials from civic and religious leaders” are also a few noted ridiculous things to do in an attempt to get off the waitlist? Now, should you do anything if you’re on a college waiting list? Absolutely not! Should you do nothing while you’re on the waitlist? Absolutely not either. You must indeed be proactive but proactivity should by no means involved baked goods or family photos. Seriously, family photos? Oy vey.

When you’re on college waiting lists, you should send letters of enthusiasm and you should update admissions officers at those colleges on any subsequent significant achievement of yours. With the keyword being significant. They don’t care what you ate for breakfast this morning. They don’t care if you just got a new dog. Significant. Significant. Significant. We can’t emphasize this enough. Want to know some other things not to do. As stated in the “New York Times” piece, students put themselves in the doghouse when they “[insult] the college’s judgment or taste. They have disparaged classmates who already got in. They have threatened to go over the admissions officer’s head. Showing up and demanding an interview is inadvisable. Showing up with a camping tent, even more so.” The camping tent is a famous case from many years ago in college admissions. Don’t do these things! Don’t even think about it!

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Grades After College Acceptances

May 10, 2013
Grades After Admission, Grades After College Admission, University Admission and Grades

Your grades after college acceptances matter. Don’t slack off or your offer of admission can indeed be rescinded. But, yes, a ‘B+’ is ok.

Grades after college acceptances matter. What your grades are like before you’re admitted to the college you’ll be matriculating to should be what your grades are like after you’re admitted. If you’re an ‘A’ student before, you should be an ‘A’ student after, too. But we do recognize that you’re not a robot. You’ve spent years working so hard to get into the college of your dreams. You’ve aced exam after exam, completed paper after paper. It’s ok for you to relax a little bit and enjoy the rest of high school. Seriously — you should. Does that mean your grades should drop significantly? Absolutely not. Your letter of admission can certainly be rescinded. It happens all of the time.

But what happens if you slack off a little and get a ‘B+’ instead of your usual ‘A’ in a class? Nothing will happen. It’ll be ok. Your offer of admission likely isn’t going to be rescinded over a ‘B+’. If you start getting straight ‘D’s,’ then, yes, there is an excellent shot that your offer of admission will be rescinded. But most people fall into the first category of students, not the second. If you’re super worried that your ‘B+’ will jeopardize your offer of admission, stop worrying. Seriously. That’s silly. Relax.

But while getting a ‘B+’ is ok, a change in behavior isn’t. If you start getting into trouble at school or with the law, there is an excellent chance that your offer of admission will be rescinded. So if you feel that your relaxing and taking it a little bit easier than you did prior to your offer of admission is in your future, know that changing your behavior is a really bad idea that can jeopardize everything you’ve worked so hard to achieve. Be the same person you were before your offer of admission and be the same student you were before this offer, too. But, yes, a ‘B+’ is totally ok.

While you’re here, check out this post on Senior Year Courses.

Categories: College Admissions Tags: , , , ,
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Students on College Waitlists

May 9, 2013
College Waitlists, Students on Waitlists, Students on University Waiting Lists

Students on college waitlists who have no intention of attending these colleges should take themselves out of consideration immediately.

Students on college waitlists should not remain on these lists if they have no intention of attending these universities. As an example, if a student is admitted to Yale and has every intention of attending Yale (and would never consider attending Columbia over Yale), then he should not remain on the Columbia University waitlist. By remaining on the Columbia University waitlist just to “see if he can get in” (an expression we hear and read so often from high school students), that student is effectively hurting other applicants on the Columbia waitlist. It’s narcissistic. It’s not right. Too many high school students do it — and even brag about it — every year.

If a student needs the ego boost that badly — if they need that feather in their cap so they can say for the rest of their lives that they were also admitted to Columbia but chose to attend Yale — he or she needs to read a book on empathy. It never ceases to amaze us when we hear students boast about how they’re going to stay on four waitlists even though they already got into their dream school just to see how many acceptance letters they can get. It’s so dumb. And it’s so dumb that they would choose to brag about this. What are they thinking?

So if you’re a student on a college waitlist with no intention of attending that university, remove your name from that waitlist today. It’s very easy to remove yourself from a waitlist. Think about all of the other people on that waitlist who actually would attend if they gained admission. Do it for them. Seriously. Like right now.

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Changes to the ACT

May 8, 2013
ACT Test Changes, Changes to SAT Exam, SAT Exam Changes

Changes are coming to the ACT. The test will soon be offered on computers.

There are changes to the ACT brewing. Major changes. In fact, the ACT will no longer be an exam taken with paper and pencil. Instead, it will be a computer-based examination beginning in the spring of 2015, reports Tamar Lewin of “The New York Times” in her piece on the ACT. As for students at schools at which computers are not available, students at these schools can still take the ACT with paper and pencil. And for students who prefer taking the test by paper and pencil, they still can if they’d like, according to Jon Erickson (president of ACT’s educational division), as reported in Tamar Lewin’s piece in “The New York Times.”

And how will shifting the ACT from paper and pencil to computers impact the content of the exam? It won’t. The content of the ACT — with its four sections of English, reading, math and science skills, and the optional writing section will largely remain the same. According to “The New York Times” piece, “The computer-administered ACT will, for the first time, move beyond fill-in-the-bubble multiple-choice questions, with some optional items in which students perform virtual tasks to reach their answer. For example, Mr. Erickson said, one science question shows four beakers of chemicals, and lets students manipulate the items, pouring one beaker into another to monitor changes in density. Students might then be asked to predict the order of the layers if all four chemicals were poured into the same beaker. ‘We think these constructed-response items will allow students to get much more engaged and enthusiastic about what they’re doing,’ he said.”

What do you think about these changes to the ACT? Do you think it’s a good thing that the ACT will now be a computer-based exam or do you think pencil and paper was the better way to go? Do you think the SAT will soon be a computer-based exam as well? Let us know your thoughts on the matter by posting below! And, don’t forget…The Ivy Coach offers terrific ACT prep to students around the world.

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Best High School Ranking

May 7, 2013
High School Ranking, Best High Schools, Best American High Schools, Best High Schools in America

“The Daily Beast” and “Newsweek” have put out a new high school ranking and it’s worth checking out.

“The Daily Beast” has a best high school ranking out and we thought we’d share with you some of their top picks around the nation. Of their rankings, they’ve got a best of the south, best of the northeast, best of the west, best of the midwest, and most transformative. According to “The Daily Beast,” “This year our ranking highlights the best 2,000 public high schools in the nation—those that have proven to be the most effective in turning out college-ready grads. The list is based on six components: graduation rate (25 percent), college acceptance rate (25 percent), AP/IB/AICE tests taken per student (25 percent), average SAT/ACT scores (10 percent), average AP/IB/AICE scores (10 percent), and percent of students enrolled in at least one AP/IB/AICE course (5 percent).”

Before we jump into which high schools ranked well in this algorithm, we wanted to draw your attention to the algorithm itself. As you’ll note, 25% of the algorithm consists of AP tests (or IB / AICE) taken per student. Only 10% of the formula consists of how the students actually do on these tests. Remember when we wrote about how certain high schools forced students to pay for (and take) AP tests even though the students had no shot of getting college credit even if they got a 5? This is their motivation! And that’s why it’s completely unethical. If a university has no math requirement and math is a student’s least favorite subject, she shouldn’t be forced to take the AP Calculus AP test after having already been admitted to the college of her choice (at which she’ll never take a math class). It’s a waste of money. It’s a waste of a student’s time. And it’s all because of high school rankings. We at The Ivy Coach support high school rankings by reputable sources like “The Daily Beast” and “Newsweek.” We just don’t support high schools attempting to manipulate rankings at the expense of students.

Anyhow, enough venting. So which high school ranks best in the south? That would be the Carol Martin Gatton Academy of Mathematics and Science in Bowling Green, Kentucky. Coming in second in the south is the International Baccalaureate School at Bartow High in Bartow, Florida. Rounding out the top three in the south is the School of Science / Engineering Magnet in Dallas, Texas. In the northeast, High Technology High School in Lincroft, New Jersey takes top prize. Placing second is City Honors School at Fosdick-Masten Park in Buffalo, New York. Rounding out the top three is Biotechnology High School in Freehold, New Jersey. In the midwest, Signature School in Evansville, Indiana places first, followed by Northside College Prepatory High School in Chicago, Illinois and International Academy in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. And in the west, BASIS Scottsdale in Scottsdale Arizona claims the top spot. This school is followed in the west by BASIS Tucson North in Tucson, Arizona and American Indian Public High School in Oakland, California.

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