<p>
Well, as Pizzagirl said, thank goodness. The horror of thinking your S might have to continue his education in the presence of such inferiority was keeping me awake at night. What if (gasp!) two midwestern kids on their own in a distant city had found a connection in their common origin and (horror!) got together and ended up making genetically inferior babies?</p>
<p>yolochka, you seem to have quite the opinion here for someone whose profile says their birthday is January 1, 1995, thus making you 18 years old.</p>
<p>I would like to divert this discussion away from MIT.
(The irony of this comment does not escape me.)</p>
<p>However, I would like to run some numbers . . .
No, I mean I want to set some odds . . .
No, I mean I want to carry out a probabilistic analysis.</p>
<p>For the analysis, I need an estimate of the following per cent:
Out of the entire group of students who are admitted to Yale, what per cent do you think also applied to Harvard?
If you can give separate estimates for SCEA vs. non-SCEA, that would be especially helpful.</p>
<p>I am also interested in your estimates of the per cents, with Yale replaced by Princeton. Then with Harvard replaced by Yale, etc.–that is all the combinations of HYP taken two at a time.</p>
<p>I don’t think that Harvard, Yale, and Princeton are looking for very different qualities in the students they select, although there might be some variation around the borders. If you have opinions on the differences in qualities that Harvard, Yale, and Princeton are looking for, that would be quite interesting. For present purposes, I would like to leave other universities out of this particular analysis–not saying that HYP are the “best,” just that they make up a grouping for my analysis.</p>
<p>Sorry…not interested in being part of your “study”.</p>
<p>QM, why don’t you start another thread? Your question might be lost on this one.</p>
<p>Another quick comment: The University of California, Berkeley has been suggested as an alternate university for a “top” student who did not get into a “top” school. I agree 100%, if the student is a Californian. In fact, if you look at the National Research Council rankings of universities, for their graduate programs, it is probable that Berkeley will show up near the top (maybe at the top) in multiple fields. I think this has strong carry-over value for undergrads in those fields. Berkeley used to advertise that if the university were a “nation,” it would rank high on the list of nations ranked by their numbers of Nobel Laureates.</p>
<p>The main drawback I see with Berkeley is for out-of-state students. For a middle-class, out-of-state student, Berkeley is just about as expensive as a private university, is it not? And it might be more expensive than a private university with a large endowment.</p>
<p>Ok, to #2207–I will give it a try.</p>
<p>thumper1, I am not trying to study what people think about the per cents. It is often argued that a top-quality applicant will not be shut out of <em>all</em> “top” schools, although they may well be shut out of some. If they are shut out of all “top” schools, it is sometimes argued that something is wrong with the applicant, the essay, the letters of recommendation . . . I believe this issues is susceptible to a probabilistic analysis. I haven’t seen figures on the number of cross-applicants anywhere, and need some range of per cents to carry out the analysis.</p>
<p>Already been done. I think this is the article. Full of lots of statistical mumbo jumbo for your enjoyment, QM [A</a> Revealed Preference Ranking of U.S. Colleges and Universities by Christopher Avery, Mark Glickman, Caroline Hoxby, Andrew Metrick :: SSRN](<a href=“Page Cannot be Found”>A Revealed Preference Ranking of U.S. Colleges and Universities by Christopher Avery, Mark E. Glickman, Caroline M. Hoxby, Andrew Metrick :: SSRN)</p>
<p>Agree. Not a good idea to divert this thread further. Better to start a new thread on that topic.</p>
<p>I am guessing about 50%-60% overlap between Yale and Harvard applicants and about 30-40% between all three.</p>
<p>I figure the following as requirements.</p>
<p>Harvard likes people who do lots of APs and a lot of subject tests for their academic admits. They are not leaving anything to chance in terms of academic ability.</p>
<p>Princeton likes high SAT scores and high class ranks</p>
<p>No one seems to know about Yale! Believe me, I have asked a lot of people because D was very interested a couple of years ago! Some how they seem to know how not admit those admitted by Harvard.</p>
<p>All three usually seem to like the same athletes though.</p>
<p>The published version: <a href=“http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/papers/1287.pdf[/url]”>http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/papers/1287.pdf</a></p>
<p>Man oh man. So many holes in that cheese.</p>
<p>I did start a new thread. I have read the article you cite, jym626. I don’t think it has the numbers I need. It seemed to be focused on proving that Harvard was the natural top choice. Caltech was treated as a complete anomaly, when it turned up high in the data analysis in that paper.</p>
<p>Thanks, texaspg–I do appreciate it. I have started a new thread as suggested, and will see if anyone posts on it.</p>
<p>Crickets? Cobwebs?</p>
<p>For once, I think that lookingforward and I are in complete agreement–at least, if lookingforward means that the revealed preference ranking is full of holes.</p>
<p>If lookingforward means that the probabilistic analysis <em>I</em> proposed is full of holes, well then nothing is new! However, I haven’t even started it yet!</p>
<p>Well if yhou cant find the numbers in that article, doubtful you’ll find ant=ything more scholarly here, on cc. Sorry to say. Try reading this <a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2006/09/17/weekinreview/20060917_LEONHARDT_CHART.html[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/imagepages/2006/09/17/weekinreview/20060917_LEONHARDT_CHART.html</a></p>
<p>But agree-- bad plan to hijack this already wandering thread</p>
<p>yolochka, maybe you also missed the part in this thread where we mentioned that MIT has studied the success of women and men at MIT and found that women were doing just as well or better than men even though their SAT scores were lower. It’s not all about stats.</p>
<p>One more for ya, QM. But then will stop redirecting this thread [ScienceDirect.com</a> - Journal of Econometrics - How have college decisions changed over time? An application of the conditional logistic choice model](<a href=“http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304407603002549]ScienceDirect.com”>How have college decisions changed over time? An application of the conditional logistic choice model - ScienceDirect) </p>
<p>Read Hoxby’s research in this area. But it takes economics into consideration.</p>
<p>Back to Berkeley as an alternative choice for “top” students, where they can receive an excellent education. It certainly fits my criteria, except for the cost for out-of-state students.</p>
<p>However, it is not possible to substitute “Generic State Flagship” for Berkeley and be able to say the same.</p>
<p>UIUC is another good choice. They have a long hallway lined with portraits of their Nobel Laureates and (as I recall) also members of the National Academies (Science and Engineering, at least). Again, not so economical for out-of-state students.</p>
<p>At some state flagship universities, three or four strides will carry one past all of the portraits of National Academy members on the hallway. At others, there may be a frame in storage, available for the first member to be elected.</p>
<p>The state flagships are very different from one another, despite the common label. Some of them are excellent alternatives, some are very good alternatives, and some are very far from Berkeley’s league.</p>
<p>I am concerned about the level of state funding for public universities, and the consequences for the quality and accessibility of instruction, though.</p>
<p>Thanks, jym626, as mentioned, I did start a new thread. The title is something like: Will a “top” student be admitted to some “top” school? Help, please."</p>
<p>You do make me laugh sometimes, QM. And you did once give me a green dot. I meant the former. On the front end, we don’t know where kids cross-applied. Except when they let it out. </p>
<p>Preference can’t- gawd, how many timed do we say this on CC?- can’t be measured apart from other factors. Except hypothetically. I dunno. Need wrap my head around it.</p>
<p>This thread is taking a left turn again. Better to discuss in that other thread, though your title doesnt match your question, so you may not get what you want, QM.</p>