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The more schools back off ED, the lower both their selectivity and yield rates go. And at least in some degree, many schools seem to be reducing the % of the class admitted through ED.
Folks here are sophisticated and understand how this works. But many schools crept toward having half the class admitted through ED rounds and appear to be trying to bring it down a bit. My guess is that for many, a slippage in both acceptance rate and yield may owe itself to a shift in how much of the class is admitted in the early binding rounds.
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I actually thought about that and wondered what impact that would have on yield. I continue to believe that a good majority of ED spots go to athletes. Anyway, I asked Gemini to sort the NESCAC by % of total student body who are varsity athletes:
Based on enrollment and athletic participation data for the 2024–2025 academic year, the following rank order lists the 11 NESCAC schools from the lowest to the highest percentage of undergraduate students who are varsity athletes.
Generally, schools with larger student populations, such as Tufts and Wesleyan, have a lower density of athletes, while smaller campuses like Bowdoin and Williams reach higher percentages due to having many varsity teams relative to their smaller student bodies.
Seems like the % of athletes as a proxy for students who commit ED would very much affect yield. Though I’m sure there is other nuance to it that is not immediately observable from a big data scoop, it’s a decent rough cut and I know of no other hooked group that uses up ED spots like athletics. Whatever the case, many NESCACs are overperforming in yield relative to their ED% (again, using the total athlete population % as a proxy for ED %) while others are underperforming or maintaining par.
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For those more knowledgeable than me: is there a decent source that shows the percentage of students admitted via ED among the NESCACs?
I wonder how much variation there is within the conference, particularly in light of the variation in the percentage of varsity athletes at the schools.
The best place is each school’s common data set, if the school fills that section out. If they don’t report it there, look at the student newspaper and/or College Kickstart.
Also, the most accurate athlete numbers come from the equity in athletics site, which provides headcount by sport and an unduplicated number of athletes. Link here: Equity in Athletics
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It is section C21 of the CDS. Schools often report out on this in their publications as well. So yes, it’s available, but a little research is required to do the year over year comparisons.
It seemed that post pandemic, many schools ratcheted up their ED admissions, which intuitively makes sense; lots of uncertainty on many fronts. It also seems that as things have normalized, many schools have been tinkering with the adjustments they made, whether TO policies, etc., and ED may be one of them. If I were to generalize (always dangerous here!), I’d say that there will always be a cohort for who ED will be a necessity (athletes, legacy, special programs like QB) and there will always be a cohort who know they have a first choice, can afford the COA the NPC gives them, and who want the process done by New Year’s.
But the kids who have been applying ED because they feel they need to in order to game the system, the kids who don’t just want to accept the COA but compare offers, and the kids who needed one more semester to improve their resumes are significant in number AND equally good candidates. They also have very vocal support, so in many cases, schools are making more room for them in the RD round.
So there may be a slight shift in that direction. But arguably, at these smaller schools, there’s not a ton of wiggle room after you have addressed the “need to ED” pool.
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Just bear in mind that Gemini is not getting its data from a verified source. Could be reddit etc and that those percentages are directly linked to the number of sports and the size of the school. Bates has 1900 students and 31 varsity teams. Williams has 2000 students and 32 varsity teams. Tufts has a much larger undergrad population and many fewer teams.
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That’s fair and why I try to disclose when I’m using an AI tool. Having said that, I perused which sources it pulled from and all the school websites were included. But there were also other sources, including this forum. ETA that the tools sometimes seem to randomly pull data inaccurately, as was the case with the yield data table from IvyWise. In that case, I did a spot audit and caught it. I did not spot audit the athlete % table, so caveat emptor. But I think it is at least directionally accurate.
And it shouldn’t be that complicated. The teams are all disclosed along with their rosters. One thing you won’t get from that is the number of walk-ons who may or may not have applied ED.
But as to the number of teams and the size of the school, that’s the whole point. If you are admitting a larger percentage of your class through ED, it would seem that would help your yield.
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Yeah, just use the Equity in Athletics site that I linked above. That report/database is a federal requirement and has the number of athletes we want…unduplicated number of athletes, including all varsity sports. Some schools on their websites might for example, make the number/proportion of athletes seem smaller by not including non-NCAA sports like men’s rowing, squash, and/or sailing.
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That’s interesting. When I have more time, I’ll do a check of the various school sites. My impression based on perusing over the years is that the school sites include a team page for all varsity sports, whether NCAA-sanctioned or not. For example, Trinity Squash definitely has a team page on the athletics website, and I’d be surprised if the schools with varsity men’s crew teams don’t also include those (but I’ll check). Amherst women’s crew is not a varsity sport and thus not included on their website. But, to your point, Bowdoin women’s crew is also not a varsity sport but is included on the website. So, there, the issue is that it might have inaccurately inflated the Bowdoin varsity athlete percentage.
And for those wondering, the importance of varsity vs. club is that only varsity sports involve recruiting and the use of ED as part of the commitment process. For purposes of this discussion, we should assume that the club sport rosters are all RD students (even though some might be ED).
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Right, but if you count up the all the rostered athletes, you will double count some individual athletes who play more than one varsity sport…at some D3s the number of students playing more than one varsity sport is not insignificant. The equity in athletics site has both total number of rostered athletes and unduplicated number of athletes.
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I wonder if Bowdoin helps this along with ED2 which Amherst and Williams do not have. Also, despite the prestige at the other two schools, Bowdoin offers a better quality of life for students. (I have ties to Williams, not the other two schools)
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And yet another variable that makes this all, as you say, a little imprecise. Some (I think many) NESCACs have ED2. I know Wes does.
And then the walk-on factor. I think NESCAC varsity athletics are competitive and time-consuming enough such that walk-on status is probably not that robust but that will also vary by sport. At my soccer kid’s college, which is a popular place, there were kids who tried every year but it didn’t look fun, I didn’t think the program welcomed them all that well and they had zero chance of playing time. When the athletes factored that in, they tended to drop like flies. In rowing, OTOH, walk-ons seemed to stick. I never saw one make the 1st varsity boat or get to row at the HOCR but there was nonetheless a place for them somewhere and the team culture was warm and welcoming - the top (fastest) rowers respected the bottom (slowest) based on who they were as people. So, back to the subject, there were probably 5 or so young women every year on the crew team who were walk-ons who would be counted as varsity athletes on the team roster even though they didn’t go through the recruiting process and hence didn’t necessarily ED.
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Also worth noting that a couple of NESCACs notably do not share their ED data: Tufts and Colby.
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WRT ED and SLACs, it occurred to me with S26’s application process that if someone was truly interested in that environment, and they were looking at selective SLACs, that they’d better do their research early and figure out if ED was going to make sense. Middlebury made that crystal clear during their campus tour, when the admissions rep point blank said: “we love our ED kids. If you ED to Middlebury, you will have an advantage.” And she wasn’t talking about athletic commits or legacies. She was talking to all of us in that room. And when I went to go look at Middlebury’s CDS and saw that two-thirds of the class came from ED, that statement rang true. This also strikes me as true at Bates, too, and likely other NESCACs, especially ones with ED2 (which seems clearly tied to the knowledge that they are going to get good amount of Ivy ED rejects and they are OK with that).
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Ok, I’m going to pull it -unduplicated athlete count - from the EADA database:
Amherst - 605 athletes, 1,907 total students, 31.7%
Bates - 700 athletes, 1,753 total students, 39.93%
Bowdoin - 668 athletes, 1845 total students, 36.21%
Colby - 693 athletes, 2,282 total students, 30.37%
Conn - 691 athletes, 1,959 total students, 35.27%
Hamilton - 698 athletes, 2,044 total students, 34.15%
Middlebury - 715 athletes, 2772 total students, 25.79%
Trinity - 722 athletes, 2,167 total students, 33.32%
Wesleyan - 727 athletes, 2,962 total students, 24.54%
Williams - 680 athletes, 2,060 total students, 33.01%
So, for concentration of athletes from highest to lowest, it goes:
Bates (34.4% yield)
Bowdoin (53.8% yield, the NESCAC yield champ)
Conn (15.9% yield)
Hamilton (39.5% yield)
Trinity (22.1% yield)
Williams (50.31% yield, the NESCAC yield runner up)
Amherst (39.7% yield)
Colby (39.6% yield)
Middlebury (41.9% yield, which I would say is the top yield performer relative to athletic concentration)
Wesleyan (34.9% yield)
It represents a pretty tight band until you get to Middlebury and Wesleyan, both of which benefit (for this measure) from higher total enrollment. Of course, nobody is close to Tufts, which is why I didn’t include them. After putting these numbers together, you can assess Tufts by just glancing at them.
ETA: I’m adding each school’s latest yield, as disclosed on IvyWise.
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Let me also say that I have never understood, but do not know definitively, that legacy required ED. I’ve only understood it as a plus in admissions just as underrepresented minority status was used. In any event, if legacy required ED, that is yet another variable throwing this all off because not all the NESCACs practice it anymore.
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I’ll say this: I don’t have an axe to grind with ED, especially if it’s used outside the athletics recruiting context.
These little schools are little schools. The people they admit have a big impact on the experience for everyone else. I think it’s exactly a perfect thing for a school to know that there’s a kid out there saying, “Yep. I want Middlebury. I know where it is. I know how cold it gets. I know the town is small. I don’t care about any of that. That’s where I want to go to school. That’s where I want to be, 100%. I’m not waiting for Dartmouth. I want to be a Panther.”
Like, why is that so unpopular? I think it’s flattering to the school that they can attract a bunch of ED applicants and it helps them plan!! They can still get out of the ED contract if financial aid is insufficient. Like, I really don’t understand when ED became the poster child for privilege. It is a useful tool for everyone involved. If Middlebury can fill their class with people who made Middlebury their first choice, then more power to them. They are educating people who want to be there, not people who really wanted to go to Yale but didn’t get in.
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Coming into this late, but I think I’ve lost the thread.
I would think there are plenty of kids in NESCAC varsity sports who weren’t “recruited” and therefore didn’t need to ED. I imagine there is a post that shows percentage of ED at these schools somewhere upthread that we can compare these numbers to?
Are there roster limits in D3?
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