Prestigiosity Ranking of Universities/Colleges based on Yield to Admit Ratios

College Search & Lists
1

Yield to Admit Ratio is the Ratio of the Yield Rate of an University divided by its Admit Rate.

The thought with this methodology is that Universities that have the highest Yield and lowest admit rate are probably the most prestigious schools where a lot of students apply and very few students turn down an offer aka a good proxy for prestige

This metric is usually harder to game than either the Admit rate alone or the Yield rate alone. Not that it cannot be done of course.

This ranking is just for fun and is not meant to make a statement about the value of education at any of the schools.

Data is based on 2014 IPEDS data submitted by schools.

There are four numbers here. The first number is the Rank. The second number is the Yield to Admit Ratio, which determines the rank. That number is followed up by the Admit Rate and then the Yield Rate as reported to IPEDS

OK. So here are the rankings

Rank Name Y/A Ratio A-Rate Y-Rate
1 Stanford 15.6 5% 78%
2 Harvard 13.5 6% 81%
3 Yale 11.7 6% 70%
4 Princeton 9.4 7% 66%
5 MIT 9.0 8% 72%
6 Columbia 8.9 7% 62%
7 UChicago 6.7 9% 60%
8 Brown 6.6 9% 59%
9 UPenn 6.5 10% 65%
10 Claremont McKenna 4.5 11% 50%
11 Duke 4.4 11% 48%
12 Dartmouth 4.3 12% 52%
13 CalTech 4.3 9% 39%
14 Pomona College 4.0 12% 48%
15 Cornell 3.8 14% 53%
16 Northwestern 3.5 13% 46%
17 Pitzer College 3.5 13% 46%
18 Bowdoin 3.3 15% 49%
19 Vanderbilt 3.2 13% 42%
20 UC-Berkeley 2.9 16% 46%
21 Amherst 2.9 14% 40%
22 Georgetown 2.8 17% 47%
23 Harvey Mudd 2.6 14% 37%
24 Swarthmore College 2.5 17% 43%
25 Notre Dame 2.5 21% 53%
26 Tufts 2.4 17% 41%
27 Middlebury College 2.4 17% 41%
28 Williams College 2.4 19% 45%
29 Rice 2.3 15% 35%
30 Johns Hopkins 2.3 16% 37%
31 Colorado College 2.2 18% 40%
32 Washington & Lee 2.2 19% 41%
33 WashU 2.1 17% 35%
34 Barnard 1.9 24% 46%
35 Davidson 1.9 22% 42%
36 UCLA 1.9 19% 36%
37 USC 1.8 18% 33%
38 Chapel Hill 1.6 28% 45%
39 Careleton 1.6 23% 36%
40 Haverford College 1.6 25% 39%
41 Bates 1.5 25% 38%
42 Vassar College 1.5 24% 36%
43 UVA 1.4 29% 41%
44 Wellesley College 1.4 30% 42%
45 Wesleyan University 1.4 24% 33%
46 Hamilton College 1.3 26% 35%
47 Colgate University 1.3 26% 34%
48 Michigan 1.3 32% 41%
49 CMU 1.2 25% 30%
50 Colby College 1.2 28% 33%
51 UT - Austin 1.2 40% 47%
52 University of Florida 1.1 46% 50%
53 Kenyon College 1.1 25% 27%
54 Emory 1.1 27% 29%
55 Scripps College 1.0 28% 29%
56 Oberlin College 1.0 33% 34%
57 Wake Forest 1.0 34% 34%
58 GeorgiaTech 1.0 33% 33%
59 Lehigh University 1.0 34% 33%
60 NYU 0.9 35% 33%
61 William and Mary 0.9 33% 31%
62 Grinnell College 0.9 28% 26%
63 Boston College 0.9 34% 29%
64 Smith College 0.8 42% 33%
65 Wisconsin-Madison 0.8 57% 43%
66 Tulane 0.7 28% 20%
67 Brandeis 0.7 35% 24%
68 Ohio State 0.7 53% 36%
69 Texas A & M 0.7 71% 47%
70 Penn State 0.6 50% 32%
71 Rochester 0.6 36% 23%
72 Macalester College 0.6 36% 23%
73 UC-San Diego 0.6 33% 20%
74 Pepperdine 0.6 35% 21%
75 Boston Univ 0.6 35% 21%
76 UC-Irvine 0.6 37% 22%
77 Northeastern 0.6 32% 18%
78 Urbana-Champaign 0.6 59% 33%
79 UC-Santa Barbara 0.6 36% 20%
80 UC-Davis 0.6 40% 22%
81 Trinity 0.5 48% 25%
82 RPI 0.5 38% 19%
83 Southwestern 0.5 49% 23%
84 TCU 0.5 49% 23%
85 SMU 0.5 52% 24%
86 Villanova 0.4 49% 22%
87 University of Miami 0.4 38% 17%
88 Rhodes College 0.4 60% 25%
89 Austin College 0.4 54% 22%
90 Case Western 0.4 38% 15%

2

There have been two admissions cycles since IPEDS last updated its system. Places like Colby and Wesleyan that have seen big moves will cry bloody murder. Just sayin’.

3

I just worked with the latest data files they had available

4

IMO, the metric captures both yield and acceptance rate. To some degree, it is an improvement. But this metric is more about the relative scarcity (or, in some sense, selectivity) of the supply of a university’s slots relative to their demand, and probably less about prestige.

5

I just checked the 2014-15 IPEDS data for Brigham Young University. I get A = 47%, Y = 78 %, and Y/A Ratio = 1.7.

So you’ve somehow omitted one of the top national universities. BYU should rank just below UCLA and USC, and just above UNC and UVa.

6

Although I said it is an improvement, the metric is still subject to manipulation. The easiest way to do it is to increase the size of applicants by (1) sending out tons of e-mails or printed materials to invite applications, (2) reducing effective application fee, (3) drops supplement essays, (4) drops SAT II, (5) do a lot overseas promotion…

7

Liberty University, based on 2014-15 IPEDS data: A = 22%, Y = 47%, and Y/A Ratio = 2.1.

So Liberty is even more prestigious than BYU. Should rank above UCLA and USC, just below Johns Hopkins, comparable to WUSTL. Certainly a different perspective than USN&WR.

8

And that does this system in once and for all haha

9

Challenge is schools that highly leverage Early Decision. Yield on ED approximates 100%, and then greatly drives down the Admit Rate in the RD cycle because they are filling far less seats. Especially when they can waitlist rather than just accept…

So I am not sure what that number shows

10

Berea College has a 37% admit rate and 72% yield. 1.94 - puts it at #34 I believe.

11

Olin should be top 10

12

Heh–it looks like tuition-free is another way to “game” this ranking :slight_smile:

13

Yield * acceptance rate = (# enrolled / # accepted) * (# accepted / # applied) = #enrolled / #applied.

So this metric takes away the possible gaming behavior on #accepted. It is more difficult to game on #enrolled, but it is not that hard to game on #applied. :slight_smile:

14

They game # accepted based on early decision. Colleges need to get to the # enrolled. They can accept less if their yield is higher, which it is based on early decision.

15

Oh, no… THIS is the classic thread on prestigiosity http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/10999050#Comment_10999050

16

Sorry. I should have mentioned it. But I mostly took the top 50 universities and top 25 LAC’s and a few other schools for which I already had the data. People are welcome to add to the list and post updates.

17

Some universities surely game on #accepted (and yield etc.). But when one multiply yield to acceptance rate, #accepted will cancel out since #accepted is the numerator of one ratio and the denominator of the other. In other words, the determinants of yield*acceptance rate consisted of two things: (1) #enrolled (the sum of ED/EA enrolled and RD enrolled) and (2) #applied. That is it. Note that #enrolled is pretty much fixed regardless how a university games via its ED policy because if it enrolls more via ED, it must be true that RD enrollment needs to be less when it has only so many seats (due to facility or resource constrains) for the incoming cohort.

18

But the tongue-in-cheek thread is a classic. Is yours also a parody?

19

Is yield included in USN&WR’s methodology?

20

In that case, you might expect service academies to rank highly. And in fact, they do.

US Naval Academy: A = 7.9, Y = 85.2, Ratio = 10.7 (between Princeton and Yale).
US Military Academy: A = 9.5, Y = 84.6, Ratio = 8.9 (like Columbia or MIT)
US Air Force Academy: A = 16.6, Y = 80.5, Ratio = 4.9 (between Penn and Duke)
US Coast Guard Academy: A = 18.1, Y = 65.7, Ratio = 3.6 (between Northwestern and Cornell)

The database didn’t have any numbers for the US Merchant Marine Academy, don’t know why