<p>ACT:
Composite - 32
Eng - 33 Math - 32 Read - 31 Sci - 32 Eng w/ writing - 30</p>
<p>Academics:
GPA: unweighted: 3.91 weighted: 4.56
top 7% in class
junior year: AP bio
senior year: AP calc ab, AP stats, AP Chem, AP macroecon</p>
<p>Activities:
Tennis: jv (2 years) varsity (2 years)
math team (4 years) 3rd in regionals
math honors society (2 years)
key club (3 years)
national honors society (1 year)
club soccer (1 year)
prayer group leader (1 year)</p>
<p>*Good essays, checked by university worker
*Visited campus</p>
<p>A couple of years ago (Michigan admitted 50% of applicants), I would have said safe match. Right now, assuming Michigan has similar increase in applicants as last year, Michigan’s acceptance rate will likely hover around 30%. If that is true, I would say Michigan is a match. If Michigan has a similar increase in applicants as it had in 2010 (20%), I would even say reach. It all depends on the number of applicants Michigan receives this year.</p>
<p>Alexandre - I agree with you on the increasing difficulty to gain an admission only up to a point, but would be an interesting discussion topic. If you are to assume that the quality of the matriculating candidate can not go up at all universities with the common app (everyone can’t be getting better - as they would in Lake Wobegon), then in the end I would argue that the same qualifications of a candidate necessary to gain admissions two years ago will be about the same as will be needed for 2013. Sure, the acceptance rate will drop but, to some extent, I would guess the yield would drop as well. There will be simply more applicants (unqualified and qualified) but a lower yield on the accepted qualified candidates. I don’t have the yield results in front of me for the last few years, but over time, I would think that there is still only one seat for each student at universities across the country. If Michigan has increasingly more qualified enrolled students, then are the other top universities enrolling less qualified candidates?</p>
<p>wayne, there are several points to clarify.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>The number of highly qualified high school applicants is growing, while the size of colleges is staying the same. As such, it is natural that more and more gifted students are going to be spread evenly among more universities.</p></li>
<li><p>The quality of Michigan students has always been relatively high. The average student at Michigan has ACT/SAT ranges that come close to Brown, Cornell and Georgetown. The difference between Michigan and those schools is not the quality of the students, but the odds of getting in. A few years ago, a top student was virtually guaranteed admission into Michigan. As the acceptance rate dips to 30% or lower, more and more qualified applicants will be turned down, eventually reaching a point where even top students will consider Michigan a reach.</p></li>
<li><p>Universities go through periods of increased selectivity. It happened to Northwestern and WUSTL in the 90s and to Chicago and Johns Hopkins in the last decade. Michigan is in the next group of schools that will see a significant shift in selectivity. The quality of the students will not improve much (mean ACT will rise from 30 to 31 or 32 and mean SAT will rise from 1350 to 1400), but the odds of getting in will drop significantly.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Which brings me to the same point I have been making for years. Student quality is a constant at all top universities. Whether the average student at a university has a 30 on the ACT or a 1350 on the SAT (non-super scored) or a 31 on the ACT and a 1430 on the SAT super-scored matters little. What separates universities in the quality of the faculty and of the facilities and the . You will eventually have over 50 universities with excellent student bodies, but only portion of those universities will be truly great.</p>
<p>Just because a university worker checked your essays means absolutely nothing as to whether or not you get admitted. I’d say you have a good chance, but we’re not admissions counselors. Other helpful info that weighs in their minds is what state your from, your high school, and your recs. Michigan OOS gets more competitive each year, but their admissions are a toss up. I’m a freshman here and I have seen an incredibly wide range of the types of students who got in last year and those who didn’t.</p>