Slightly confused about U Chicagos's acceptence rate?

Colleges & Universities University of Chicago
5

<p>I posted this on another thread where a poster had the same question:</p>

<p>The admissions percentage is a factor of both how many students apply and how many students who are admitted attend.</p>

<p>Chicago turns off prospective applicants for a few reasons:

  1. It is a school with a Great Books tradition with an emphasis on academics. That sounds yummy to a Chicago applicant, but it grosses out a lot of bright and talented kids.
  2. The Uncommon application turns off prospective applicants.
  3. The lack of a huge party scene.
  4. Its non-ivy status doesn’t help, either.
  5. Misdirected fears of “the hood” of South Side Chicago versus the campus’s location in Hyde Park (which features everything from affordable student apartments to multimillion-dollar homes and the likes of Barack Obama and Carol Moseley Braun)</p>

<p>I also have friends who are attending Yalevard who balked on Chicago’s application and reputation. In hindsight, this was a good thing-- both of them, while extremely academically talented, don’t have the “Chicago personality.” While they like school enough and they’re good at it, they like skipping class and partying more. It’s not that Chicago’s all that difficult, I don’t think, but that it’s impossible to skate by on easy classes, though it is at almost every other elite school. (And get higher grades for it!)</p>

<p>I also see Chicago’s non-east-coast-ness as another hindrance. From the way I see it, Northwestern and Vanderbilt are better schools for students than most of the ivies-- good location with a nearby city, good party scene, good sports, good academics-- and yet these schools don’t get the numbers of applications and the kind of yield that the ivies do, even though there’s every indication that one would be happier at NU or Vandy.</p>

<p>**</p>

<p>It’s still easy to come to the conclusion that Chicago is not “as strong” as the ivies based on priority of admission. However, one could just as easily look at Chicago’s SAT midrange, which shows that Chicago students test similarly well to Ivy League/ other elite school students. Anecdotally, the other students I know who turned down top schools to come to Chicago are not necessarily at the top of Chicago.</p>