<p>The number of students applying to colleges this year has skyrocketed. Indiana University, which I’ve been able to confirm from a phone call, said “The number of applicants applying this year has doubled”, this being in November. Just today I got an e-mail from Baylor saying this.</p>
<p>"We have experienced a record number of freshman applications over 20,000 for the fall of 2006. Because Baylor is committed to maintaining its tradition of academic excellence, a low student to faculty ratio, and small class sizes, we must now take steps to ensure that we do not exceed our capacity. </p>
<p>Therefore we have started a wait list for freshman applicants who have not yet been admitted. While we can’t fully predict the future, we anticipate that limited spaces will become available for wait listed students. However, students who are not taken off the wait list for fall 2006 may be offered a space for spring 2007."</p>
<p>How are the SAT/GPA based colleges going to take all of these kids? For instance, Nebraska anyone who gets a 20 on the act is promised admission, similar with Mizzou, and Iowa. If twice as many people decide to go there, what’s going to happen?</p>
<p>I think students are applying to more schools because of the uncertainty of the process. Previously student would apply to 5 or 6 schools and now they are applying to 8 or 9. Add in the greater number of students applying and it being easier to apply to multiple schools via the Common Application I would expect the number to continue to go up.</p>
<p>Eagle, I agree with you. Also, since more students are applying to more schools the competitive nature of the process is increasing. Most of my son’s admissions letters stated something about this being their most competitive year to date. I recall my friend’s son getting similar letters last year too. I think students are applying to more “safety” schools, as well as to reach/match schools, to make sure they have a place to go, and to see if they land a large merit scholarship. This is driving up competition. I also think that students with higher stats can be more easily drawn to their safeties with merit awards.</p>
<p>You can find statistics for the number of high school seniors graduating each year. Every year the number increases by 50,000 to 100,000 until 2009, when it levels off and starts to decrease. So our kids are really caught in competitive times.</p>
<p>I also think that kids are applying to more schools and it’s the schools themselves that are encouraing this. My son was innundated with schools offering free on-line applications, many with optional essays. And he’s a B student - I wonder if his higher ranked friends get even more offers?</p>
<p>Three years ago my daughter applied to four colleges. This season my son applied to 9. He paid for two applications and would probably have applied to just four if we had to have paid for more. Most of the applications had an option of using an essay of your choice so he could just cut and paste the same one. We figured, if it only takes 10 minutes, he might as well apply and then just see what happens.</p>
<p>On the flip side, I’m sure it’s challenging for lesser regarded colleges as well. The HYP’s know they’ll have full classes no matter what, but lower down schools have to walk a fine line between over and underenrollment. No doubt there’s a lot of tough decisions ahead for them as well.</p>
<p>I would also add in that a higher percentage of today’s graduating classes are headed toward college than say 25 years ago. Though I also read that the high school drop out rate is up significantly.</p>
<p>I dare say Baylor has so many applications because of the top ten percent law in the State of Texas. </p>
<p>UT-Austin and Texas A&M, as well as Texas Tech, Texas State, U of H and other state supported schools are filling to near capacity with applicants who MUST be admitted according to the law. The kids outside of the top 10%, especially high scoring students from uber-competitive publics in the suburbs of Houston, Dallas and Austin are forced to seek admission at privates like Baylor, SMU and TCU. Kids who wouldn’t normally even go to a four year college straight out of high school because their record at a less competitive school would cause them to be rejected are now guaranteed a spot.</p>
<p>In most of these competitive suburban schools, the senior classes have between 500 - 800 students, which means the top 50-80 kids make up the top ten percent. And in these schools, it is common to have 20 kids with near perfect GPAs tied for valedictorian. The remaining 30-60 kids have only one or two Bs on their entire record. Many of the students take their required h.s. on-levels (pe, technology, health, first year languages) in summer school during junior high so their high school gpa and ranks will not be adversely affected. The goal is to be ranked with as many as possible As in above level courses with extra weighting, before senior year. For kids in Texas, the consequences of Bs or on-levels on your record are more severe than for kids in other states. If the Bs or on-levels cost a student his top ten percent slot, then no admission to flagship schools and parents have to fork over private school tuition or out-of-state tuition.</p>
<p>Very stressful times in the State of Texas.</p>
<p>“UT-Austin and Texas A&M, as well as Texas Tech, Texas State, U of H and other state supported schools are filling to near capacity with applicants who MUST be admitted according to the law.”</p>
<p>Actually, it is not really an overstatement because after filling their quota with top ten percenters, a state university must consider the remaining top ten percenters when filling the remaining spots. So a non top ten percenter must compete directly against a top ten percenter for one of those places. The actual end result is far more than 2/3 of the student body is a top ten percenter. UT and TAMU have taken steps to create spaces for those highly qualified applicants who are not top ten percent by avenues such as summer admissions programs, CAP and academic admits. </p>
<p>Most don’t mind being a summer admit, but no one wants to be capped. If a highly qualified student is capped to UTD or UTSA, chances are they will opt to go out of state or private. Other states are delighted to have them. Arizona State is one university keenly aware of the problem and they actively seek to attract high scoring kids from Texas who are not top ten percent due to geography. A newspaper article in an Arizona paper actually said this will be the downfall of post secondary education in the state of Texas and ‘what is bad for Texas is good for us’. Evidence that this may not be an overstatement either is in the fact that UT graduation rate over a 6 year period has dropped below 40%…which apparently has freaked the Board of Regents out a bit.</p>
<p>Many highly qualified non top ten percenters are no longer looking at UT or TAMU as an automatic first choice destination anymore. Something is wrong with this picture.</p>
<p>My daughter is top 10% in Texas but I echo much of what ldmom is saying. Since D has decided to go out of state (at least in large part, there is one exception), we have conversed with admissions people from many states who have all said the same thing-suburban Texans with 1300-1400+ SATs who are top 20% at a competitive school are flooding the market. We became aware of it when trying to play the geo diversity card, or at least wanting to, only to find that their are Texas students leaving the state in droves, and going literally everywhere. And they got there before we did. LOL. </p>
<p>The only student (singular) who managed to get into A+M (around here Texas is definitely not considered the flagship uni LOL ) from D’s school last year without an auto admit was a Corps Cadet, and a tuba player. Legacies are being told to go to Junior College and transfer in. Old-time Aggies are seething.</p>
<p>Now , I don’t think Tech or the other schools are nearly at that same level.</p>
<p>My son is top ten percent in Texas but has elected to focus on out-of-state schools. He is fortunate to have this choice.</p>
<p>Like you, he has heard from his friends that the ones in a tight bind are those with SATs in the 1300s and top 20% ranking at competitive high schools. Bellaire HS in Houston has a phenomenol IB program. It is so strong that many excellent students have a class ranking in the second decile with SAT scores over 1400. Some of these kids do not get into their first preference Texas school (or even their second preference) and make the kind of choices that you’ve mentioned. Last year, one friend ended up at Brandeis, and the other at Arizona State.</p>
<p>This is even having an impact on where students go to high school. We already saw the writing on the wall and were leary about sending our son to Bellaire. We felt he would not be well served given the way college admissions functions. We’ve had other students talk to us about this and choose to opt out of Bellaire in the interests of preserving their ofspring’s “ranking”. This is no small thing for families that are middle class but where money runs tight. The relatively modest tuition at the state schools is a big draw, but the parents are also concerned about getting their children into schools that will provide enough of a challenge for them.</p>
<p>There has been some talk of the Legislature revising the system. But they need to be responsive to the needs of all sectors of the Texas community and that’s not easy. It just seems that people squabble as the pie begins to shrink.</p>
<p>reply to #14
UT has to take all top 10%-ers that apply. There is no “quota” or liimit. There was much discussion in the last legislative session about putting in one, but the lege didn’t do so. So the remaining 30% of slots at UT were fought over by in-state lower-ranked students and out of state students.</p>
<p>Your original statement (in #12, 2nd par.) that <em>all</em> state schools are filling their classes with top 10%-ers was shall we say factually-challenged. For UT it is just a major overstatement. </p>
<p>By the way, Curm, A&M, the near-flagship, is about 10 percentage points behind UT, stuck with admitting about 60% top 10%-ers.</p>
<p>All this really means is that the near-10% folks from the great suburban high schools who are not automatically admitted have to compete with each other for 30% of the slots at UT, 40% at A&M, and are shoo-ins everywhere else.</p>
<p>I do agree that there are many, many suburban kids whose families come from long loyal traditions of Longhorns or Aggies, who are shocked and infuriated when they realize a spot might not be available. Paraphrasing Tom Cruise in Risky Business: Go Red Raiders!</p>
<p>my bad dt - the quotas and the process I described are within each college at UT. </p>
<p>I have recently spoken to administration at Texas…the top ten percenters are expected to exceed 75% this year. An article in the Chronicle quoted concerned school officials as believing that soon most desirable (top-ranked) state schools in Texas will fill to capacity with top ten percenters . The first school to fall will be Texas. TAMU is considered a ‘success’ story so far because their percentage of top ten percenters has remained high but unchanged over the last several years, whereas Texas has increased every year. But after Texas fills, the situation at TAMU will likely change. Those in college administration I have spoken to here in Texas are frustrated. They feel it is their job and purpose to holistically evaluate every student and they are prevented from doing so by the Legislature.</p>
<p>What is sad is that my d has friends who are brilliant, near 1500 SATs and are just outside of the top ten percent. They want to major in business at McCombs, but McCombs tends to fill out their top ten percent quota with kids ranked in the top 1%-4%. So not only do her friends have to compete with other brilliant non top ten percenters for the ‘holistic’ spots, they have to compete against the remaining top ten percenters. Chances are they’ll get in at Texas, but not in their desired major. AND ironically, these kids stand a better chance getting in a top notch business school out of state rather than in. The same is true for engineering, communications and architecture. The choice becomes go to the school of your dreams and take whatever major (CLA) they’ll give you or don’t go to the school of your dreams and hope you can afford the out of state tuition.</p>
<p>It doesn’t seem wise for the State of Texas to produce these highly qualified kids, and then lose them to post-secondary institutions in other states. Ideally they would stay in state and be content to go to Baylor, Tech or State …which would ultimately have the positive effect of bringing these schools up in the college rankings. But realistically, many won’t. They don’t have to when they can go out of state and get in a highly ranked school now.</p>
<p>Also, what is occurring within the school districts in response to the law also needs to be discussed. In our district, accelerated, honors and AP courses are now weighted the same. This happened in response to pressure from parents whose kids couldn’t handle honors or AP and who were being shut out of the top ten percent because the AP and Honors kids were getting more weight in their GPA. So now at my d’s school rankings are flipped. Most of the top ranked kids haven’t taken honors or APs…they don’t want to risk their GPA/rank. The kids who still take honors/APs even though they get no extra points, and who end up with the occasional B in those honors/APs, find themselves behind the kids who took the less challenging courseload. </p>
<p>Manipulation begets manipulation unfortunately, until the system is a mess.</p>
I’m a Texas public school mom, and our H.S. does not issue letter grades, just numerical grades - so the ranking is really precise (son got a 91 in Spanish, etc. His GPA is 4.276, or something ridiculously specific). Students who take high school credits (P.E., health etc.) in summer school during junior high get high school credit and high school grades, so it only saves them time in their schedule later. No boost there - except room for more weighted classes. I guess the schools are different in how they arrange things. Our school district doesn’t determine vals and sals until 3-4 days before the ceremony - they use final grades!<br>
I agree with the problems with automatic admittence to UT etc. We know of many kids at the magnet science academies who do not fall into the top 10% due to the extremely selective nature of the school… it negatively impacts them in the merit scholarship area also.</p>
<p>Our district shows the h.s. credits from junior high on the h.s. transcript, but does not include them in the rank or gpa computation. Which is why we have so many junior high kids in summer school…such a shame the kids can’t even have their summers off without feeling like they are falling behind.</p>
<p>The other adverse effect of the top 10% law is on the kids who want to go to Ivies or other highly selectives which require a top ranking PLUS the APs and Honors classes. Imagine the pressure of trying to get to the top when you are taking the most difficult courseload possible and you are trying to get past kids skating at the lowest level possible.</p>
<p>There are a couple of legislators fighting to rescind the law…I plan to get involved. The more I learn, the more unhappy I become.</p>