The new CDS data is painting a very grim picture for high need Internationals

Applying to College
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So quick background. In the 2023-24 CDS, colleges are now encouraged to break out basic International admissions data from domestic data (which is further broken down into state versus non-state data). I note not all colleges are providing this data. It also has a section on financial aid to Internationals.

So periodically as I have been involved in discussions with high need International applicants for this cycle, I have been looking at that data, and overall–it is very grim.

Like, to the extent it is available, it appears International acceptance rates at colleges with a lot of need aid available for Internationals are way, way lower than domestic acceptances rates. Overall International acceptance rates are then higher at the need aware colleges, but then it appears they often are in fact using being need aware to trim out at least most high need Internationals.

Here is a post in which I walk through the numbers for the need blind/full need for Internationals college (when available), versus Hopkins:

I decided to spot check WashU as well. WashU had an acceptance rate of 5.9% for Internationals, versus 13.6% for domestic applicants. WashU was more generous than Hopkins when it gave aid to Internationals–an average of $63,918. But incredibly few Internationals got any aid from WashU–it looks like only something like 3.3% of International enrollees.

The bottom line is we knew it was bad for high need Internationals. I for one did not realize it was THIS bad.

Anyway, I just thought I would flag this for anyone who is ever discussing admissions with high need Internationals. Again, we knew it was bad, but I think in many cases it is even worse than many of us expected, and it is now often possible to look up some numbers to help illustrate how bad at specific colleges.

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Why do you characterize this as “bad”?

This seems unnecessarily binary- it’s either good or bad. I don’t see it that way. Most internationals who want to study in the US have solid and affordable options in their own country- or another country where they can easily get a student visa and funding.

So getting a full ride (or near full ride) is ALWAYS a Hail Mary pass. Whether the odds are low or extremely low- what does that change in reality? EVERYONE needs an affordable safety. EVERYONE needs to fully calculate the COA which includes travel, health care coverage, etc.

What’s changed?

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I did. And I’ve been telling people for years that the international acceptance rate for an applicant not needing aid from a need-aware university is about half the overall rate and that it’s about 25%-30% if needing aid or if applying to a need blind university. It will be great when more universities provide the data

Additionally, it’s important to understand that when a university that was previously need-aware for internationals becomes need-blind, international applications will skyrocket and the acceptance rate will decrease further, since the numerator (international acceptances) won’t change even when the denominator (international applicants) surges.

Of course, it still won’t tell us the chances for a particular applicant.

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I guess part of my point is that at a lot of these colleges, even that estimate seem overly optimistic for high need Internationals specifically. Meaning it appears for high need Internationals specifically, at colleges like Hopkins or WashU, the acceptance rate is getting down to a much lower percentage of the overall acceptance rate.

Like this isn’t directly reported, but back of the envelope, for WashU I would estimate it is somewhere on the order of 0.2%, so like 3.4% of the overall International acceptance rate, maybe 1.7% of the overall mixed acceptance rate.

For Hopkins, it could actually be 0%, but it might be in a similar range as WashU. I don’t think it could be too much higher.

So that’s the part I think is worse than at least I expected.

But it may be worth doing another, so I’ll just semi-randomly choose Lafayette (semi- because it came up in a relevant discussion recently).

OK, for Lafayette, the overall acceptance rate was 31.5%, but this decomposed as 6.1% for Internationals, 44.0% domestic.

Lafayette advertises itself as meets need for Internationals (but not need blind), and in fact its average aid to Internationals was $69729. And it looks like about 49.5% of their enrollees got aid, which is not bad. On the other hand, Lafayette did not have as high a yield among Internationals as these other colleges, and I would bet in part that is because non-high-need Internationals were less likely to yield.

So assuming a pretty high yield rate among high need Internationals in particular, and then some back of the envelope assumptions about how many of their International applicants were high need, I would guesstimate their high need International acceptance rate was 3%, or possibly less.

Now on the one hand, that is a lot better than Hopkins or WashU. In fact, that may be a bit higher than the acceptance rates you see at need blind/meets need for International colleges. So in that sense, Lafayette is maybe a bit better of a bet for high need Internationals, at least really well qualified high need Internationals, than a Princeton or Bowdoin or so on, and much better than Hopkins or WashU.

Still, if that estimate of 3% is about right, then that is like 10% of their overall acceptance rate. Again, better than WashU or Hopkins, but still quite a low fraction.

Anyway, take it for what it is worth. But I for one am going to be pretty cautious going forward about what I suggest to high need Internationals, and I am specifically going to try to use this new CDS data to give them assessments.

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Well, semantics aside, part of what has changed for me is how I intend to discuss these issues with high need Internationals specifically. Like, I intend to look at this CDS data to try to give them more realistic assessments.

Including relative assessments. Again, I for one did not realize just how low (if you don’t like “bad”) the high need International acceptance rates might be at colleges like Hopkins and WashU. Like, I knew they were going to be pretty low, but I didn’t know they might be getting down to just fractions of 1%.

Similarly, I did not realize that at, say, Lafayette, it might be under 3%. Again, I knew it would be low, I didn’t realize it could be that low at such colleges.

To me all this matters not because it will change whether or not high need Internationals should have a robust non-US option. I agree that is not a new insight.

To me it matters because what even counts as a realistic US strategy in detail, meaning which colleges a high need International might apply to, depends on the details of how different colleges seem to be treating high need Internationals.

But for sure, that is just my perspective.

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This is not worse than I expected. It seems more and more international students, and many with financial need, are applying to U.S. colleges. As more apply, even if the same number are accepted, the %age of accepted international will go down.

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I have another angle on the international applications.

Denison has about 20% international in the first-year class - about 115. While some are soccer players from Denmark or the like, the overwhelming majority are from Vietnam, China or Japan.

So, if Denison is deemed to be “international friendly” with financial aid, would that not generate a tremendous number of applications from international kids? Getting thousands of apps from international kids could really skew the overall acceptance rate, which has been 17% the last two cycles.

Denison did not publish its international application numbers in the latest CDS but I have to think it is getting a significant number.

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I am guessing I may be stating the obvious, but here goes:

Bringing on a high-need student puts a lot of work on the school. Both of my daughter’s colleges (1 an ivy and 1 a LAC) have winter clothing drives, student driven fund raisers for money for the extras and toiletry drives for high need students. This is not being taken care of by the school and students don’t have the funds for all the things needed on campus.

The higher number of high need students are domestic students and all of this is organized and supported by the students - not the schools. (Some schools do add extras - but again, a small number of schools) Coat drive at the Ivy my daughter attended asked for 60 winter coats in varying sizes for students without a winter coat - all set up on Amazon for students and families to purchase. I was shocked year 1 and not anymore when it pops up yearly. We also get emails asking for $ to help pay for a visit home, money for additional food and donate to meet the very small tuition gap.

Add in an high need international student - the amount of extra funds needed would even increase due to travel costs, school breaks and all the other items mentioned above. Can this student get an internship, work and stay in the US after graduation? It is not easy and schools need to think about that when accepting an international student.

I know boarding schools get so many applications from amazing international students with high need and one of the pieces of the evaluation is college - will this student graduate from the boarding school and be able to attend/afford college in the U.S, as the options are limited?

I don’t find the low acceptance numbers shocking - I find the lack of care and financial pressure these students continue to feel once they are on campus to be the shocking bit. (again - not all schools)

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Many of the international students requesting help from the essay readers group are high need and applying to US schools. They put in a lot of work for low odds. It is kind of heartbreaking.

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Maybe this is not what you meant by “international friendly”, but, although the school meets demonstrated financial need for accepted international students, Denison is not need-blind. There was a big group from China when my son was there but otherwise the international population is quite diverse.

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So looking at their financial aid numbers, it does appear that for a smaller college, Denison may give out a decent number of relatively high-aid offers to Internationals. Indeed, it actually has a significantly larger total budget for International aid than, say, Bowdoin, which is nominally need blind for Internationals, and indeed a slightly higher budget than Amherst. But it spreads that aid around more, so I suspect Amherst, at least, gives more really high-aid offers than Denison. But I suspect not Bowdoin.

And yes, I think it is a good bet that means it is attracting more high-need International applications. But at least they are available at all.

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