Let's quibble over semantics: what do we really mean by "highly selective" (Ex: Pitzer v Williams)?

Corinthian
Fri, 22 Apr 2016 22:15:56 +0000

School C sounds like USC. I agree it’s selective for Fall admissions. School D is also obviously selective. D’s higher yield suggests it is the first choice of more of its applicants – but maybe it also has better financial aid and is more affordable? And it’s of course not enough data to choose, except that C is obviously a very big school which was a significant factor for my kid who wanted someplace smaller.

If all colleges had a purely stats driven admissions process, then yes you could assume that any student who got into Williams would also have been admitted to Pitzer. But I submit that in a holistic admission system, that’s not necessarily true. Of course if we had a purely stats driven admissions process then results would be more predictable and students wouldn’t feel compelled to apply to more and more schoos, causing a vicious circle of ever lower acceptance rates.