@gallentjill “how do you know how many tenured faculty are in a department?”
here ya go! Have fun! Faculty info is available under “Human Resources”
https://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/datacenter/InstitutionByName.aspx
here is the master site where you can find LOTS of information.
https://nces.ed.gov/ipeds/use-the-data
The department web site of the college often has faculty listings. You can note the titles (“professor” and “associate professor” have tenure; “assistant professor” is on tenure track but does not have tenure).
This is not always obvious. However, you may be able to find some information from a web search of “[college] change major [major]” and/or “[college] declare major [major]”. If it lists a competitive admission process or requirement of grades higher than C or GPA higher than 2.0, then it is limiting intake, presumably for capacity reasons.
@ucbalumnus @menloparkmom You guys are the best. Thanks!
There’s a difference between checking what a college offers you and looking for an idea of what can make you a match in their eyes. Of course, some schools make it easier than others.
D1 had a not universally offered major in mind. We not only checked that it was available, but the backgrounds and ongoing research interests of faculty. And that faculty teaching those courses actually had experience with that field. At some schools, that wasn’t so.
Try to glean what the school is looking for. In that way, you can show some of that in your app. That’s not faking or bending yourself into their pretzel. If you’ve done the matching, you’ll have an idea of those traits you do have. As an example, many know Yale likes “leaders.” On CC, many kids aiming there tend to talk in terms of their club titles, they founded something, etc. It’s not that simple, that superficial. They miss the rest, how Y also talks of the attributes behind leadership qualities, motivation, energy, curiosity, and how that’s been shown in choices through hs- or not.
@lookingforward hmmmm…can’t see how CC is better than bloggy experts… :-?
@lookingforward My daughter is not applying to Yale so this is really just for educational purposes, and because I hope to use the knowledge for other schools. Where does Yale talk about these things? How does the average applicant find these things out?
Pm’d you.
We have a lengthy debate about match and yield for colleges, and stress and disappointment of students but we don’t see efforts of colleges to improve the match and yield and to reduce stress and disappointment. If colleges, parents, and students perpetuate in this situation then the stress and disappointment level will get worse. I believe only the colleges can provide a solution.
I think colleges may want to do something like this (I am sure colleges and other posters can have better proposals): Break the application cycle into 3 rounds. Students can only apply to a limited number of colleges (let’s say 3) in each round. If a student is not admitted to any college in the first round, then he/she can apply to 3 more colleges in the second round. If a student is not admitted to any college in the second round then that student must think carefully before applying to 3 more colleges in the third (last) round. If a student is admitted to some colleges in the first or second round but is not happy with the results, he/she can also apply to 3 more colleges in the third round if he/she is willing to forfeit the results in the first round (he/she is allowed to keep only one acceptance from the previous rounds). With these 3 rounds of application, students will have more chance to try and adjust their goals so that they will likely to have an acceptance in the end. And colleges will also do less work in building their desired classes.
Stress and disappointment IMHO seem to be mostly caused by insufficient care in loving a couple of schools that are likely to love you back and lack of affordability. Restricting the number of applications doesn’t seem like a solution for either of those.
Go to the college web site; find the department - and look for a list of faculty. You can see by their titles whether they are tenured or not. Often there will be a page where faculty bios are posted as well. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Academic_ranks_in_the_United_States#Most_common_hierarchy
You can find statistics as to how many students are graduating in each major from any college at https://nces.ed.gov/collegenavigator/
Enrollment figures by classes & department are a little trickier – some schools have a lot of information posted online, some don’t. For example, this info is very readily available for Columbia (which includes Barnard) at http://www.columbia.edu/cu/bulletin/uwb/ – you can choose any subject or department and browse through and see how many classes are offered during a semester and how many students are enrolled. That site happens to print both the current enrollment figure and the max class size – so it is easy to see which classes are full and which aren’t. Other schools may not be so easy. But simply looking at number & level of courses offered each semester will give a sense as to the school’s priorities.
While I think that it’s somewhat valuable to look at college marketing materials to get a sense of what the college values in a students-- I think some of that info need to be taken with a grain of salt. Of course colleges like “leaders” and “doers” … what college is going to market themselves as a place for “followers”?
But my daughter got into University of Chicago (back in the days when their admit rate was reasonable & not crazy) with an approach that provided a counterpoint to their “life of the mind” slogan. She submitted humorous essays and poked fun at the “where fun comes to die” meme … I’m sure she came across as bright and capable, but certainly not cerebral. Now I’m not advocating deliberately jagging away college marketing either… just don’t draw the conclusion that Yale’s celebation of “leaders” means that leadership is a requisite for admission.
Just for fun:
88 College Taglines, Arranged as Poem: https://www.chronicle.com/article/88-College-Taglines-Arranged/232003
look at the press release of the university whey they release their ED or EA, SCEA info and when they announce their full class in April. Stanford e.g. talked about 18% of the class being first gen, having all fifty states represented etc… So a first gen from North Dakota is pretty much in (I kid but you get the idea). Another university will say that 1000 kids got in via ED, 500 RD, now they’re not going to give you the percentages, but you should know that if 2/3 of the class is early decision, that’s probably your best bet.
As someone mentioned a lot of colleges make their admitted essays public, which is good also. However, it would be much more helpful if they made public the essays that got rejected.
“And honestly, the application we put out to Stanford was the best one we could possibly have produced in 2 months, so we would have had no regrets at all if we were denied; we had absolutely no expectation we would be accepted.”
I don’t think there’s any kind of correlation there, much less causation. The Stanford app is time consuming for sure but kids spend 4-5 months on it and don’t get in, while some kids spend a few weeks and do get in. If you’re a recruited athlete and you have a commitable offer from the coach, you’re probably spending a day or two on it. Let’s not forget the guy who got in by just saying Black Lives Matter on one of his Stanford essays.
“And honestly, the application we put out to Stanford was the best one we could possibly have produced in 2 months, so we would have had no regrets at all if we were denied; we had absolutely no expectation we would be accepted.”
Who’s application was this? You mean your kid, right? 
I think he/she meant the satisfaction of a job done as well as “they” could, when submitted. That satisfaction, as opposed to the crapshoot talk from many. Control what you can and understand what aspects you can’t. (Yes, it should be the kid.)
I don’t trust marketing mailings any more than I trust pro advisors purporting to have an inside scoop. But you need to get a sense, for yourself, what helps your app vs hinders. It’s an application with questions. They read your answers, not just the stats. No gimmies, no do-overs.
The Yale bit I noted just shows how kids mix up “leader” qualities for hs club titles and etc. Same with taking the advice to just do what you want and not what you don’t, as gospel. It’s life advice, not admit help. Some schools take what they can, others are more discerning, can afford to be. If you care, why not try to be your informed best?
@theloniusmonk where does one find essays from accepted kids? I’ve never seen that on colleges’ websites.
Here are some essays from JHU:
https://apply.jhu.edu/application-process/essays-that-worked/
I have hired dozens of Yale undergrads over the last few years. (and interviewed hundreds). Yale has the same distribution of leaders, followers, extroverts and introverts as any other “hard to get admitted to” college. Some kids get admitted to Yale and play cello in the symphony and tutor inner city kids in math (neither requiring or exhibiting leadership). Some kids attend Yale and spend every extra hour working with a professor on a detailed statistical analysis of census data and voting patterns in the last few elections (neither requiring nor exhibiting leadership). And yes, the kids who end up as Rhodes scholars and Marshall scholars typically exhibit strong leadership and outward facing interests. I met a kid who basically lived in a genetics/bio lab somewhere in New Haven (or West Haven maybe?) junior and senior year working with a team of grad students and two professors. Nothing that would manifest as leadership- just a brilliant and promising young scientist.
But not everyone at Yale is or wants to lead- some are happiest pursuing an interest to the depths and back, and if that happens to be a solo pursuit they are fine with that.
From Yale’s website:
I read that to mean that Yale is looking for people who will be at the forefront of their fields. Thats very different then saying Yale is looking for “leaders” as the word is commonly used. They don’t want to fill the class with elected officers and community activists although they would probably want SOME of those types. But they clearly also want the kids who are going to push the boundaries of science and scholarship and be leaders in many other ways. If I were crafting an application for Yale, I would try to stress what I could bring to the future of my area of interest. It wouldn’t be enough to explain that I won a math contest, but I would want to show my exuberance to find new ways to use/apply/discover things in the field of mathmatics.
The “What is Swarthmore Looking For” page is different. They seem to be seeking slightly different qualities. There is more stress on learning for its own sake, collaboration and community service. This is just from a quick glance at the web pages. But I think its fair to say that they are not all looking for the exact same thing.
Right @lookingforward ?
I agree with @lookingforward in terms of really trying to understand what they are looking for in terms of character qualities vs. a list of titles. My Dd didn’t have leadership titles, but she was invited for interviews for several leadership type scholarships. She wrote an essay that talked about how she was a quiet, behind the scenes leader, the person who ensured the success of the organizations she was part of bc she observed what needed to be done and did it. She also talked about how she was an observer who watched out for new members reactions when joining and if they seemed to be struggling with connecting with the group that she would go out of her way to introduce herself and help them feel comfortable. Essentially, her essay was about not being a leader who was up front and being recognized by a title, but possessing the leadership qualities that benefited the organization and the people in it.
ETA: @gallentjill Just saw your above post. Yes, that is the way we approach it. Dd researched and chose schools to apply to that fit her personality and strengths.