<p>[Regular</a> Admits May See 3% Acceptance Rate | News | The Harvard Crimson](<a href=“http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2012/3/27/three-percent-admission-2016/]Regular”>Regular Admits May See 3% Acceptance Rate | News | The Harvard Crimson)</p>
<p>"Although Harvard College saw 1.9 percent fewer applications this year, the acceptance rate looks likely to decrease nevertheless. Since the admissions office plans to count on a yes from the vast majority of students accepted through its renewed early action program, Harvard may admit as few as 3 percent of the students waiting to hear their decisions this Thursday.</p>
<p>Overall, Harvard might admit about 5.5 percent of students who applied under early action and regular decision to the Class of 2016—a drop from last year’s record-low 6.2 percent.</p>
<p>If the admission rate does fall this year despite the slightly reduced applicant pool, it will be due to a new calculus in the admissions office centered on predicting the number of students accepted in the early round who will choose to come to Harvard.</p>
<p>Though Harvard has not yet announced the number of acceptance letters that will go in the mail on Thursday, the College will look to roughly replicate the size of this year’s freshman class—1,661.</p>
<p>Already, 772 acceptance letters for the Class of 2016 went out in December.</p>
<p>From this point, anyone with a pencil and paper can approximate the math going on in the admissions office. To be safe, assume that the admissions office, behaving cautiously, makes room for every student who has been accepted early to attend. That leaves about 900 freshman beds open to regular decision candidates. If the yield for that cycle is high as well—say 80 percent—Harvard can admit just over 1,100 more students on Thursday to count on 900 of them showing up.</p>
<p>In total, that means that about 1,900 acceptance letters will go out this year, plus perhaps more to waitlisted students after the first crop of accepted students make their decisions by May 1. Last year, Harvard initially accepted 2,158."</p>
Come on, think optimistically. I know it is hard. This article disheartened me, too, but we cannot change anything now. Let’s just hope that the decision is favorable. :)</p>
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