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<p>Acceptance rate is a factor but not nearly the only factor in assessing academic odds of admission. (keep in mind that I do not know you and just have your total SAT score, GPA, and that you are an IB diploma candidate and there is much more I would need to review to make an assessment for you personally) When you pick colleges for your list in terms of academic selectivity, you have to examine the data for those schools, such as the mid SAT or ACT ranges of accepted students, percentage of admitted students who ranked in the top 10% and/or top 25% of their HS class, average GPAs (unweighted), required or recommended high school curriculum, rigor of your chosen curriculum in the context of what your HS offers, percentage of applicants accepted (selectivity), and so forth. So when evaluating your chances at admissions to various schools in terms of academics, you have to assess if your “stats” fall within the ballpark of admitted students, as well as looking at their acceptance rates. It is very important to factor in the acceptance rate and not to just examine the stats of admitted students! For example, for colleges that accept less than 25% of applicants, it is not enough to fall in the ballpark of admitted students’ stats, as such schools do not accept everyone who has the qualifications to be admitted, but rather admit a very small percentage of such students. While an applicant must have the stats in the ballpark for a specific college to even be considered, that alone will not get a student into highly selective colleges that have low acceptance rates. Then, other factors must be weighed such as strength of extracurriculars, achievements, recs, essays, and so forth.</p>
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<p>First, I honestly did a quick perusal of your post and list and did not put time into looking up each school and gave general comments, because I just don’t have time to do that kind of individual assessment on a message board.</p>
<p>Here are some basic stats for the four schools you mention:</p>
<p>TRINITY:
accepts 41%
Class rank: 68% from top 10%, 93% top 25%, 99% top 50%
Mid SATs: CR 590-680, M 610-690, W 610-710, CR/M 1200-1370, total 1810-2080</p>
<p>UNION:
accepts 41%
Class rank: 58% from top 10%, 84% top 25%, 99% top 50%
Mid SATs: CR 590-670, M 620-700, W 580-670, CR/M 1210-1370, total 1790-2040
Avg. GPA: 3.6</p>
<p>SKIDMORE:
accepts 42%
Class rank: 39% from top 10%, 74% top 25%, 94% top 50%
Mid SATs: CR 570-680, M 580-670, W 580-680, CR/M 1150-1350, total 1730-2030
Avg. GPA: 3.4</p>
<p>MUHLENBERG:
accepts 45%
Class rank: 41% from top 10%, 84% top 25%, 96% top 50%
Mid SATs: CR 560-660, M 560-660, W 560-660, CR/M 1120-1320, total 1680-1980
Avg. GPA: 3.3
**Test Optional school</p>
<p>Based on the little bit I know about you, Trinity and Union may be safeties for you. However, even though Skidmore and Muhlenberg have similar acceptance rates to Trinity and Union,the profile of admitted students is not as high and these are even safer bets that Trinity or Union. Perhaps picking one of these as a sure bet, if you like them, is a good idea. </p>
<p>That said, Skidmore and Muhlenberg’s theater departments are much better known than either Trinity or Union’s. I’d likely pick Trinity’s theater program over Union as well. Muhlenberg and Skidmore have MT opportunities as well.</p>