The other day there was a discussion about the U. of Chicago writing prompts. Not only were the prompts really engaging, I’m also doubtful that AI could do a good job on them.
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My D26 has Georgia Tech on her list, and we’ve been told repeatedly that being female and being in-state are pretty big points in her favor. (But within reason. She still has to be impressive in every category, of course.)
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I read those to my 11th grader, who said, “OMG, no thanks! Good thing I’m not applying there. Those are dumb essay questions.” 
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Those questions are pretty good at determining who is a potential fit there. My D answered a question that said “What is square one, and how can you get back to it?”
It was by far her best essay she wrote for college apps, and she did that one in 30 minutes.
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Those are the questions I’d have the most fun answering. Game on! 
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C26 doesn’t have the grades for Chicago, but I think they’d enjoy answering some of those questions a lot more than “why us”!!
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I do wish that Univ of Chicago would stop sending my kid stuff in the mail. Between that and the emails, they’re constant. At least you can unsubscribe from the emails. That hasn’t stopped them from sending stuff to her in the mail.
There’s no way they would ever accept her anyway. She’s a good student, but hasn’t found a cure for cancer. And even if she had, Chicago doesn’t fit the “not cold” requirement. 
Univ of Chicago also sent a horde of stuff in the mail to D24, too…and D24 had a ~3.3 UW GPA, so she was even less of a likely admit than D26 might have been. It’s led me to assume that Chicago does all of this because they want to raise their selectivity rankings and move up in the US News & World Report list…and that’s a total negative for us. Bleh. No thanks. Glad that other people love the school. I just wish they’d stop spending $$ on sending my kid glossy stuff in the mail.
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I completely agree. They need to get rid of Nondorf, their admissions director. He’s run out of good ideas but seems to have an endless supply of bad ones.
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My DD26 feels a bit slighted- near 4.0, high rigor at very challenging school, 1500+ SAT, athlete that could add to team and yet not 1 peep from Chicago, which she’d actually consider if accepted (note I’m NOT saying she’d get in due to how competitive it is).
Though it’s disheartening that Chicago seems to make it rain for everyone else.
We had piles of U Chicago stuff for D19 but nothing for C26. I guess they didn’t tick whatever box spurs the flood.
Hey folks, putting on my mod hat for a moment. Reminder that this is a thread about trends in college admissions over the last five years. Feel free to start a new thread on U Chicago. Thanks!
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Whenever I look at this thread, I have to think of all the college students, grad students and professional school students who didn’t get an in person graduation in 2020. That was a disappointing time for everyone.
Hoping now that students can look forward to their college graduations AND celebrations of them.
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Since I was the first to mention Chicago, I’ll add another point related to the actual thread topic. It’s not so much about admission to colleges, but what families are thinking about with respect to which colleges to apply to (and/or to select) and that is: financial sustainability/viability.
Over the last five years the demographic cliff has become more real to people (though currently applicants’ families seem to be wondering if it will make admissions into colleges easier). Covid grant money from the feds boosted up many colleges that would have been struggling financially even without a pandemic, and now many families wonder about the financial strength of a school. I can see this becoming a problem that feeds on itself. Families are concerned about school’s viability so fewer enroll which exacerbates financial problems which increases concerns about the viability and lowers enrollment further, and just continues to repeat itself until the college has to close.
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Curious how you figure out that schools like Brandeis are very stats-focused vs. other peer schools? Not disbelieving, just wondering how you can know this and if it’s just reputation or something that’s visible somehow in the CDS.
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I was a volunteer college coach for about a dozen students this year, and most of them finished up with college admissions with Ivy Day today, except for a few that are waiting for Stanford tomorrow.
What I am observing is that admission to MIT is much less predictable this year than during previous years. Well known honors and awards that resulted in a 60% or higher admit rate last year are resulting in much lower acceptances this year.
While most of the students ended up at the level I expected, it’s more of a surprise this year as to which college accepted them and which didn’t. For example, I helped a student who had IMO a stellar application to Harvey Mudd and an ok application to Northwestern. Harvey Mudd gave him a straight rejection whereas Northwestern accepted.
I am also seeing slightly lower admittances to top 20 colleges than in previous years. There was one student in particular who I thought had a good chance at the Cornell / Hopkins level. She was waitlisted at one and rejected from the other. And stronger students that may have gotten several Ivy+ admittances in previous years have only a couple.
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This is an interesting thread. Thanks.
I’m farther from the admissions trends but have seen a few universities that I know well have added essay questions about how you deal with folks who have different beliefs and and opinions. This is a direct signal that these universities are no longer going to be hewing to the politically correct orthodoxy that was largely enforced prior to Claudine Gay’s defenestration. (I’m not making statements about all universities, just a few that I know).
More generally, attacks on elites generally seems to resonate well with attacks on Ivies. Forbes is even coming out with articles saying that companies don’t want to hire from Ivies and have a category of new Ivies (or something like that). Is this manifesting itself in changing application choices?
I would imagine that Jewish students might still be wary of applying to Columbia or some of the UC schools. Is that showing up anywhere?
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It would not be surprising if political environments or perceptions of such affected more students’ (and parents’) choices now than before, particularly where the politics affects actual quality of life. Where Israeli - Palestinian politics (commonly dominated by noisy bigots) went beyond protests and into harassment, doxxing, etc. is one example. Other examples that have come up here include abortion restrictions that may interfere with non-abortion medical care that is too abortion-adjacent for medical providers to be willing to do it, and anti-LGBT (especially T) politics resulting in unfriendly social and legal environments for such people.
It also would not be surprising if colleges with low ethnic diversity became even less marketable to students not of the main ethnic group currently attending.
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A reminder that this is not the politics forum, and that posts not in compliance are subject to deletion or editing at the moderato’s discretion
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Another factor that can affect application and matriculation decisions is that if the students and parents feel poorer or feel uncertain about their financial futures (e.g. fear of job loss or inflation, 529 or other investment account values dropping), they may choose less expensive colleges than they otherwise would have chosen.
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Anecdotally yes (more Columbia than the UCs) but I’m not sure anyone keeps records of application numbers by religion? You might be able to proxy a fall on campus numbers but that doesn’t necessarily gel with application trends right now.