<p>According to the latest Rice Fact sheet on undergraduate student demographics, 53% (1545) of the Class of 2008 are Texans and 47% (1388) are nonTexans (including international). Using the admit rates in simba’s post, it easy to see how inundated Rice is with Texas applicants…over 9000 applications from Texas and about 3300 from places other than Texas.</p>
<p>Despite a very measly admit rate, the actual number of spots going to Texans is relatively generous. But… it is true, this annual flood of local applications can do nothing but help their selectivity index. I have to assume the same thing happens at other selective colleges, but it would be interesting to know if it is this dramatic. I can’t imagine Harvard’s instate applications outnumber their OOS applications 3 to 1…but I could be wrong.</p>
<p>Because Harvard is much more well known, and is higher ranked, they have no trouble getting highly qualified applicants both locally and (inter)nationally. I am not sure Rice has the luxury of choosing the most highly qualified applicants of the (inter)national pool: even if there were enough of such applicants, there might be a regional preference for a different school. For instance, if a highly qualified student from Massachusetts were admitted at both Harvard and Rice, I am willing to bet that he/she will choose Harvard.</p>
<p>The problem Rice has is not only in attracting out-of-state applicants, but also in attracting the highest qualifying of those applicants and winning those cross-admit battles. </p>
<p>This is all speculation, though. It is illuminating to see how much of a force is exerted by the Ivy League. The only school I can imagine that is not so easily affected by cross-admit battles is the University of Chicago, but that is because most of both their local and (inter)national applicant pool is self-selecting. Except for a in-state residents, and a marginal amount of (inter)national residents, I cannot say the same applies to Rice’s applicant pool.</p>
<p>well i dont think the answer lies necessarily in alienating the texas residents but just attracting alot more studnets based on the prestige. to do this rice has to gain a better standing by being better known</p>
<p>I would think their objective would not necessarily be to reduce the Texas applications but to drasticially improve the number and quality of OOS applications. Their number of local applications and admits is far too overweighted for their selectivity index to be meaningful in comparison to other most selectives.</p>
<p>Part of being prestigious is being demographically, including geographically, diverse. Having a small student body with more than 50% of that student body from one place doesn’t get the job done. If they adopt the 35/65 split simba mentions and increase the size of the student body (also on the new prez’s wish list), they can possibly achieve a balance that doesn’t reduce the actual number of Texan spots, but does increase diversity by bringing in significantly more OOS students. But…this ideal is gonna involve serious outreach and marketing.</p>
<p>The biggest problem is that the prestige of Ivy-League schools is well-entrenched. Many highly qualified students see non-Ivy schools (excluding Stanford, MIT, CalTech, and so forth) as “Ivy-Safeties”; that is, schools from which they can transfer to an Ivy League after one year. Rice also has to maintain its retention rate.</p>
<p>There are many problems to be dealt with, and it is unfortunate that the preponderance of them are not Rice’s fault; the prestige-driven mindset of most students, in addition to the further entrenchment of Ivy-League schools as the ‘gold standard of education and prestige’ will continue to exert a negative effect on schools like Rice.</p>
I just don’t see that there is a “problem”! Rice is a great school and fits a special niche - great student/faculty ratio, lots of opportunities, reasonable price. They have plenty of applicants, and fill their class each year. So what’s the problem? I don’t believe there is one. Not every college can be a “top 5 college”. There is a hierarchy in the rankings - so what? And, for what it’s worth, Stanford is 40% Californians - not a big contrast to Rice’s 50% Texans. Texas is as big as a country, and has a large enough population that 50% is a reasonable amount of instate students to have enrolled.</p>
<p>I am not denying that Rice is a great school - it is still my dream school. My argument is that Rice has a problem if they want to increase their out-of-state studentry.</p>
<p>I remember reading that the new prez wants Rice to grow to 3800 undergrads - but I don’t remember anything about changing the balance of Texans to non-Texans.</p>
<p>class sizes vary…the intro classes are going to be large i think max 250-300 people…and then the smaller classes are small…like <15…but it def. depends on the class youre taking.</p>
<p>yes, the small size is one of the reasons why i chose rice over other schools…</p>
<p>go to Rice site and search for leebron’s speeches in 04 or 05.</p>
<p>…The University of Houston, by contrast, has only 2.1 percent of its students from outside of Texas. As I said we are at 50 percent and we hope to grow that higher, perhaps to as much as 65 percent. </p>
<p>no way a class has 200 kids in it! Wouldn’t that be a third of the incoming class? At most, from what I have heard, is around 75. But never 200-300.</p>
<p>The freshman chemistry lecture class has about 250 according to Prof. Kenton Whitmire, the Department Chair for Chemistry. However, the recitation sessions are broken down into smaller student to teacher ratios.</p>
<p>It is not until you get past the freshman lecture classes that the smaller student to teacher ratios kick in.</p>