<p>I wanted to know which college is more hollistic in there admission process.
Vanderbilt
U-Chicago
Duke
WashU
Northwestern</p>
<p>I would say Duke and Northwestern. Chicago and Vandy are obsessed with high test scores overall and WashU just yield protects like their life depended on it.</p>
<p>yield protects?</p>
<p>^ They reject overqualified students because they believe those students will go elsewhere.</p>
<p>Lmao? What?</p>
<p>Realize that just because schools take high test scores into account, it doesn’t mean they take the other factors any less seriously. So if you have super high test scores, it doesn’t mean you’ll be likely to get into a school.</p>
<p>The way he said it made me laugh lol</p>
<p>Holistic has one l. ■■■■■ face ;)</p>
<p>Sent from my SPH-D600 using CC</p>
<p>I disagree with goldenboy, each school (perhaps besides Wash U) is similarly holistic, but leans towards one factor a bit more (ie. UChicago loves those essays)</p>
<p>being holistic means taking all aspects of an applicant’s application into account, like essays, grades, scores, extracurriculars, job experience, etc. uchicago is just as holistic as duke or washu or any of the other schools in my opinion - if I’m not mistaken the only schools that aren’t ‘holistic’ are UCLA and Cal - but every school you mentioned reads the applicant’s ‘whole picture’ as opposed to just grades, WashU included</p>
<p>UChicago is probably less holistic than the others - if there’s a couple of outstanding parts on your app (particularly those essays), you have a chance. Duke, UChicago, and NU are all harder to get into than WashU and Vandy, though.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>if anything, this is a proof that U Chicago admission is holistic, in that admission decisions are NOT bound by pre determined factors (e.g., GPA and SAT) but rather individuals are evaluated based on the unique factors that make the candidate an INDIVIDUAL with multi faceted qualifications.</p>
<p>that said, I think this “essay rules supreme” perception is way oversold - Essays may give some boost to candidates who might have a little lower score than the other applicants. But, I don’t think it’s going to salvage any application that is way out of whack. Just look at their SAT score distribution. It is scary high. If your numbers are in the bottom 5-10% range of the admitted student scores and you have no hooks, it will be mighty difficult to overcome that deficiency with clever essays.</p>
<p>I think UChicago is pretty holistic. Six students, me included, applied from my school a couple of years back. All of the applicants had higher SAT scores than me but comparable class ranks (mine was around 2200, top 3%). One of them (class valedictorian) had 2380 (780/800/800) on her SAT. She ended up being accepted by all of the Ivy League schools except Yale (rejected), MIT, and Stanford. </p>
<p>UChicago rejected all of them. Our school counselor was shocked and called. One admissions rep cited essays as the deciding factor that differentiated us six.</p>
<p>Agree that Chicago is the most holistic and Vandy the least (does not even have a supplemental essay).</p>
<p>Because chicago is still looking to bolster its reputation, it is bound to place a greater emphasis on test scores than the other schools. However, having said that, they do also consider the essay. Therefore, Chicago is lopsidedly holistic if you know what I mean. They have two important criteria that applicants must fulfill.</p>
<p>Happyman2:</p>
<p>I actually think that, because UChicago is looking to bolster its reputation (as Duke did in the 90s, and Penn did in the late 90s/early 2000s) it’s becoming MORE holistic than it used to be.</p>
<p>Case in point, when I applied in the 90s, UChicago was known as the school where your intellectual clout (and intellectual promise as seen in essays) were pretty much the only two factors that mattered. That’s why, even in the 90s I think, when UChicago was about as selective as Tufts or University of Rochester, it probably had mean SAT scores that were in the ballpark of MIT, Yale, etc. </p>
<p>Put another way, UChicago coveted intellectualism, and it didn’t care much if you were a 3 sport athlete or a world traveler. Sure, it was nice, but it wasn’t seeking those characteristics.</p>
<p>Now, UChicago still cares a lot about grades/intellectual horsepower, and, as it’s become more coveted, it can take an even greater number of top scorers. At the same time, I think the school cares more about other factors too - athletics, participation in clubs, etc. seem to matter more. If for nothing else, the school has invested a lot in new resources (new gym, great new arts center), so the school seems more aware of these “well-rounded” characteristics.</p>
<p>To conclude, happyman2, I just disagree with your analysis. If anything, the school has grown LESS “lopsidedly holistic” over time, and especially of late.</p>
<p>Not to mention the mistaken premise at the heart of happyman2’s argument: that prestige and test scores are linked in a simple way, and that increasing median or mean test scores is a way to increase prestige. That’s not correct. In the league the University of Chicago plays in, what is prestigious is REJECTING high scorers, because you are looking for other, less easily measurable qualities. Harvard could easily have a 75-25 range of 800-790 for every test. It doesn’t do that because it doesn’t care. It wants brilliant students – and brilliant students will tend to have high SAT scores more often than not – but it doesn’t pay much attention to SATs in deciding who is brilliant and who isn’t.</p>
<p>Yes, UChicago is the most like Hollister. </p>
<h1>sarcasm</h1>