<p>The dynamic is somewhat confusing, in as much as it does not take many students who were accepted to more than one school to make a 60%+ yield rate hard to calculate as an average across schools. Certainly if only 20% or so of students were admitted to 3 or more schools it would be hard to figure However, seems unlikely that the data provided is deliberately falsified or misleading. </p>
<p>Hotchkiss is not a bad place to start for data quality, as they have municipal bonds which are rated by Moody’s (and probably others). While dated, consider the link here from a downgrade a few years back: <a href=“Moody's - credit ratings, research, and data for global capital markets”>Moody's - credit ratings, research, and data for global capital markets; </p>
<p>Excerpt:
“*Strong and improving market position with 21.5% application growth over the past two years leading to a low selectivity ratio of 16.5% in FY 2011. Yield on admitted students remains stable and was 59% in FY 2011. Total full-time equivalent (FTE) enrollment for fall 2011 was 599 students, 93% of which were boarding students.”</p>
<p>I doubt Hotchkiss would be supplying false info to the ratings agencies, so the only question is about the dynamic that lends itself to 60% plus yields. Simple averaging math would say that students applying to “highly selective” schools with 20% admit rates or lower would need to apply to 5+ to expect admission to one. Of course the population is not homogeneous, and the strongest candidates might be accepted to multiple schools. Still, on average you can imagine that selectivity + realistic cap on schools per applicant might make it likely that there are not tons of kids getting accepted to 3-4 schools with high selectivity… </p>
<p>I have also wondered if schools end up knowing more about the applicant’s probability of acceptance than you might think, either through a savvy read of candidate intentions, or even just touching base with each other. If you had a legacy candidate applying to Deerfield who had communicated a preference there, would Hotchkiss likely know this and be less inclined to offer the same candidate an admit slot?</p>