Do you really believe that you would define a matrix by having the entire 2000 admitted application disclosed in neat graphs? Do you believe the Class of 2018 happens to be identical to the developing 2019?
And then … what? You’d want the remaining 40000 to scrutinize the reasons for rejection. Of course and for whatever ulterior motive or agenda to uncover negative patterns.
And then in light of a huge stack of mixed indicators, you would have to recognize that the word holistic might refer to the sum of various parts! In a drastic departure to the notions that admissions can and should be reduced into a simple algorithm of GPA/SAT/ACT. Utterly inaccurate notions!
Are we really forgetting that a 4 percent vs a 6 percent delta is all about Angels and pinheads.
“Pizzagirl wrote:
But that’s the truth. The 3.7 kids DO have a 4% chance and the 4.0 kids DO have a 6% chance.”
JustOneDad:
"
How can that be if there is a 6% chance for the entire pool of applicants as a whole?
They certainly don’t all have 4.0.
How many applicants had a 4.0 (UW) and what percentage of them gained admission?
Is it possible that you are looking at a chart that shows 4% of the Stanford admittees had a 3.7 GPA"
JustOneDad, I posted the link upthread. I assume you didn’t look at it. Here it is again. The overall rate is 5.1% and I certainly know the difference between “the 3.7s have a 4% acceptance rate” (which is what the link shows) and “4% of the admitted class had a 3.7.”
Anyway, what are you all going to do if even the “highest” combo of 4.0/36 (or 4.0/2400) only has, let’s say, a 25% chance? Then what? Nothing changes.
No, VoR, you don’t know whether they have a functional matrix today that they could release. Obviously they have the raw data. Stats are important, but not the be-all or the deciding factor. So what use is it to parse them further? It doesn’t predict anything. Some kids who nailed the apps had this combo, more who nailed the app had that one. The individual applicant still has to nail the app or you don’t pass Go.
Btw, for the most part, at the tippy tops, schools with immense numbers applying, B’s in cores are iffy. Lack of rigor in the possible major can be an issue (or general lack of rigor,) when you’e whittling a pool down- say, Harvard’s 35k apps down to 2000. So, what use is some combo table? Maybe Billy got his 3.9 with easy choices, etc. Maybe Mary got her B in gym class, not in her heftier cores. It’s just not all about stats. It’s the whole view, what that amounts to.
The other thing that might happen is that … Let’s say they did the matrix. And let’s say the 4.0/36 had a 25% acceptance and then 4.0/2400 had, let’s say, only a 15% acceptance.
You would conclude erroneously that they must “favor the SAT” and push your 2400 kids to waste a Saturday morning trying to get a 36 on the ACT.
When, of course, the truth could be they are trying to get more Midwesterners, or fewer of them from ACT territory applied, or any number of things. But, you’d all be running out to your nearest ACT test center and woe be to the 2400 who didn’t nail a 36 too.
Same with prestige, honors programs, and what not.
You can learn a lot from results threads.
I do think that there may be unconscious biases and the system is not perfect, especially since the applicant pool is so strong these days (someone who’s great at BS’ing may get in over someone who genuinely has overcome a lot of handicaps and has great potential but just didn’t hit the sweet spot with some adcoms), but it’s hard to think up a better system (if the elites are trying to get the best student body they can, as they define it).
Eventually, adcoms will deal better with unconscious biases. Over the years, they have improved at addressing their blind spots, dealing with those that are easiest to ascertain first (so first URMs, now SES, and in the future, addressing biases). Big Data may help in that regard.
I like holistic admissions and see it as a huge positive because there is no such thing as nor has there ever been such a thing as an entirely objective admissions system.
Historically, admissions was designed to keep out intellectual, racial, gender and class undesirables. All other got were accepted. A holistic approach simply speaks the truth of it in that a college will admit whomever it wants to admit and the criteria for admission are flexible, changeable and subject to interpretation and human judgement.
The Gaokao is quite a bit tougher than the SAT as well. If they used the SAT instead in China, I reckon that Tsinghua and Beida would throwing darts to see which 2400’s they’d be admitting.
Exactly. Hpw does that really provide much insight? Both a 5% and a 14% are in the realm of “roll the dice” from the applicant’s POV. Nothing you can count on, so more precision is meaningless.
“The Gaokao is quite a bit tougher than the SAT as well. If they used the SAT instead in China, I reckon that Tsinghua and Beida would throwing darts to see which 2400’s they’d be admitting.”
And here’s the thing. NOTHING prevents any American university from developing its own test and requiring applicants to take it, if they believe that the SAT/ACT are not discriminating enough at the highest levels to tease apart the Very Meritorious from the Very-Very Meritorious from the Very-Very-Very Meritorious. But they don’t, because they don’t believe that performance on SAT/ACT alone is THAT critical. If they did, then those who got 2300-2400 would have a HECK of a lot higher acceptance rate than 14.8% at Stanford.
This is an attempt to figure out a formula and nothing else - and all it would do is create MORE stress on students, not less, as their tiger parents would say – see? you’d have a x% better chance at Stanford if you got your SAT up by XXX points, off to cram school you go. How you think this would result in LESS stress on students is beyond me. The same students who are desperate to go to Stanford would still feel desperate about getting into Stanford.
@TopTier - we also absolutely have no information about the applicant except high school and potential major. We are also asked not to look at any resumes or transcripts they may bring. I have been interviewing for over 25 years and I’ve never wanted that info. Also don’t ask what other schools they are applying to, only why they’re applying to Yale. I’m assuming if they’re applying to Yale they’re not applying to community college! I’ve have quiet kids, outgoing ones, obnoxious ones and kids almost paralyzed with nerves. They all have a story to tell.
CCs have late deadlines to apply, so someone who applies to Yale or other selective four year schools probably will only apply to a CC if s/he gets shut out.
A GPA is not the same at each school, the courses are different, the situation of each child is different. A high ACT or SAT score without prep is different than the kid whose parents who spent thousands on test prep. The kid who suffered a loss of a parent, suffered through disease or grew up with only one pair of pants has extenuating circumstances. There are many kids who are the president of some club not because they care but for their college application. There are kids who have to work, or want to work which are valuable lessons in themselves. Then there are the kids who apply to every Ivy which in itself shows fit was not a criteria but prestige was the criteria. And I wouldn’t say every high ACT/SAT/GPA kid gets into their flagship Honor’s program because the competition is stiff there as well. I think the colleges have a pretty good idea of what kid is a fit and who is not. On the other hand I honestly think many of the scholarships solely focused on community service are geared towards kids from the upper income brackets.
Pizza girl stated “Anyway, what are you all going to do if even the “highest” combo of 4.0/36 (or 4.0/2400) only has, let’s say, a 25% chance? Then what? Nothing changes.”
What changes is that those 4.0/36 kids will now apply to only 5-6 schools rather than to 20-25 schools plus their safeties.
If the matrix showed that 3.5/30 kids were admitted at 1% then most might not bother to apply instead they would focus their resources to better matched school plus their safeties.
texaspg Would it not have been helpful to students if Princeton provided information about GPA with the SAT data in matrix chart rather than just as individual categories? Would it not also be helpful if the matrix data is further broken down by ethnicity and/or SES? Wouldn’t you agree that more information is better than less?
ucbalumnus stated that the bedrock of every student’s college list is the safety school. Perhaps ucbalumnus can tell us what is a safety school and what makes a school a safety?
@voiceofreason: Actually, they could still apply to 5-6 schools.
Here’s the thing: For a kid who’s bright, hard-working, and driven who comes from a middle class (and certainly upper-middle-class) family, whether he/she attends Cornell (or even Princeton) or URochester likely will not make one whit of difference in the long run.