top 10% rule!!!

amfrance · 11-04-2009, 08:50 PM

can somebody please explain UT Austin's "top 10% rule" ? thanksssss

matsum91 · 11-04-2009, 08:53 PM

if you are applying this year and are ranked in the top ten percent of a texas high school, you're in.

If you're applying in 2011 it gets more complicated.

Austinhills · 11-04-2009, 09:50 PM

What matsum ^ said, with the caveat that you might not necessarily get into your first or even second choice major if you apply to a "restricted" major or college. I think the restricted majors/colleges are the College of Engineering, College of Communication, McCombs School of Business, Pre-Nursing and Athletic Training/Kinesiology & Health.

If you're in the top 10% of a Texas high school and don't get into your 1st or 2nd choice major, you still get admitted to UT, but usually as an "Undeclared" major in the School of Undergraduate Studies.

spdf · 11-05-2009, 09:53 AM

Here's something to chew on -- 90% of students in any given high school are not in the top 10%. So if the bottom half of the graduating class decides not even to bother applying, that leaves only the top half. But 80% of the students in the top half are not in the top 10% of their graduating class.

So how come when you remove 50% of the students from the equation, and all those students are not in the top 10%, the percentage of students who are not in the top 10% only goes down by 10%?

If you know the answer to this, continue with your application to UT. :-)

MidwestMom2Kids_ · 11-05-2009, 12:04 PM

If you are not in the top 10% of a Texas high school graduating class, UT uses a holistic system that looks at your
AI and PAI as follows. (This applies to all out of state and international applicants.)

Quote:

The UT Austin admissions routine for students not automatically admitted is elaborate and entails a
broad concept of merit. Beginning with the entering class of 1997, for those not automatically admitted,
the idea of merit was expanded from class rank and test scores exclusively to the inclusion of the
following factors:

The Academic Index (AI)
High School Record:
o Class rank3
o Completion of UT required high school curriculum4
o Extent to which students exceed the UT required units
o SAT/ACT score5

The Personal Achievement Index (PAI)
o Scores on two essays
o Leadership
o Extracurricular Activities
o Awards/honors
o Work experience
o Service to school or community
o Special circumstances:
- Socio-economic status of family
- Single parent home
- Language spoken at home
- Family responsibilities
- Socio-economic status of school attended
- Average SAT/ACT of school attended in relation to student's own SAT/ACT
- Race (addition approved by the UT Board of Regents in 2003)

Thus, merit includes the ambition to tackle rigorous high school coursework, the production of quality
prose, and the desire to make a difference in one’s school, home, or community. Evidence of
employability (work), and some sense of having excelled in any number of areas are also considered.
Moreover, admissions officials place these attributes in the context of the circumstances under which
the student lived.

The Academic Index (AI) is determined by a multiple regression equation utilizing a high school
percentile derived from an explicit class rank [1-(class rank/class size)]*100, and verbal and math test
scores from the ACT Assessment or the SAT I: Reasoning Test. The equation produces a predicted
freshman year grade point average.6 After a review of the high school transcript, an applicant can be
“awarded” a tenth of a point if he/she exceeded UT’s required high school curriculum. Thus, AI values
range from 4.10-0.00.

The Personal Achievement Index (PAI) is UT Austin’s holistic approach to admissions. Admissions
officers are trained each year to conduct comprehensive reviews of every application from students not
automatically admitted. All applicants are required to submit two essays. Each are read and scored on
a scale of 1-6. The application itself, and any attachments an applicant chooses to include, is then
reviewed. A “personal achievement” score on a scale of 1-6 is then assigned to the application. From
the three scores, two essays and a personal achievement score, a PAI is computed. The equation
reflects a 1997 faculty decision to give slightly more weight to the personal achievement score than the
essays: PAI = [(personal achievement score * 4)+(mean essay * 3)] / 7.

AIs and PAIs of applicants not automatically admitted are then plotted on an admissions decision grid.
(See Figure 1 below.) The most-qualified candidates are located in the cells closest to the upper left
corner. Admissions liaisons, and/or representatives of Deans’ offices or faculty, then make decisions as
to which cells to select as admitted students. Texas resident applicants are either admitted, “cascaded”
to their second choice of major, offered Summer Freshman Admission, or offered the Coordinated
Admission Program (CAP) at a UT System component school. Thus, Texas residents submitting a
completed entering freshman application by published deadlines are not denied admission to UT
Austin. Non-residents are either admitted or denied.

Here's the .pdf file that includes this info, and "Figure 1."
http://www.utexas.edu/student/admiss...8-Report11.pdf

MidwestMom2Kids_ · 11-05-2009, 12:13 PM

Many Texas students apply even though they do not expect to be admitted because then they can be in the CAP Program. This program lets students go to another UT campus and then automatically be accepted into UT in Austin as a transfer student.

Prospective CAP Students | Coordinated Admission Program | Be a Longhorn