<p>Many more people apply than the number of students Stanford can accept. That’s why the admit rate is low. That’s it. In theory a school’s average SAT scores could be in the 500s and still have a very low acceptance rate if a lot of people apply.</p>
<p>I really do not care for the Stanford campus. Can’t understand the attraction except popularity due to location (so few “prestige” schools on the West coast) and “wow” factor.</p>
<p>World class academics in an environment with happy students who have a very high quality of life could easily explain the attraction.</p>
<p>I still think the fact that Stanford puts such a heavy emphasis on admitting legacies could explain the ACT score range the original poster was questioning.</p>
<p>I’ve heard Stanford admissions are the least objective of all. A real crapshoot.</p>
<p>And I’ve heard that there’s a Crumple-Horned Snorkack living in Hoover Tower.</p>
<p>Seriously, we don’t know any of this stuff. Stanford puts a high emphasis on admitting legacies? Where do you get that? Maybe Stanford legacies are more likely to apply at Stanford than Harvard legacies are to apply to Harvard; or maybe Stanford better prepares its graduates to raise smart children. This goes for all schools, by the way–not just Stanford. Everyone likes to pass off conventional wisdom as fact, and sooner or later everyone believes it.</p>
<p>And my biggest objection of all: How do you make an objective measure of objectivity?</p>
<p>Sorry for the rant, but I had to get that out sooner or later.</p>
<p>I’ve gotta echo Sly Si: why on earth do you people so frequently accept sewing circle gossip and unsubstantiated rumor as fact? Stanford places greater emphasis on legacies? According to whom? That certainly wasn’t the case when I went there. </p>
<p>Granted, Dean Shaw might’ve ushered in some sweeping pro-legacy reform after I graduated, but, even if that were the case, I’ve never seen any such reasoning cited in the numerous “Stanford prefers this or that” discussions. It’s staggering, the way some of you present these blind stabs at Stanford’s admission philosophy as accepted facts.</p>
<p>Furthermore, the ACT statistics aren’t particularly useful in this sort of discussion-- only a fraction of admitted students submit them! I’m not sure what the current numbers are, but when I was a student, fewer than one quarter of applicants offered ACT numbers. </p>
<p>Moreover, we have no demographic divisions among these ACT students. What if 50% of them are athletes? Wouldn’t that skew the scores in a way that’s not really representative of more general admission standards? The SAT numbers tell a better, albeit still incomplete, story-- one that places Stanford’s quantifiable standards in roughly the same area as Princeton or Yale’s.</p>
<p>Returning to the OP’s question, why is Stanford so selective? Well, as someone astutely pointed out, the fact that, this year anyway, it received more applicants than anyone else, Harvard included, is a big reason. The school’s matriculation rate has also been inching forward (eclipsing 70% for the newest crop), meaning the school can admit fewer students to form a class of the desired size. </p>
<p>Why, given these gaudy numbers, is Stanford still slightly less competitive than HPY in terms of board scores? Who knows. It probably suggests, as some have pointed out, that Stanford doesn’t kneel before the U.S. News altar; that is, rather than selecting the class that’s most impressive on paper, the school take a truly holistic approach to assessing worthiness, creating a situation where an applicant with a 2100 SAT might be more desirable than his 2400-scoring counterpart for reasons that aren’t easily summarized in any graph or pie chart.</p>
<p>Crumple-Horned Snorkack.</p>
<p>Haha. That was funny. Kudos. Lumos. Expelliarmus. Snape kills Dumbledore.</p>
<p>It might be because Stanford fully funds all its athletic teams. That means they probably give every scholarship they are allowed to give by NCAA rules. Not giving any non-need based merit money does free up a bunch of cash. There is a lot of leeway given to athletes for getting in (my sibling went there, wouldn’t have gotten in without sports), so maybe that brings down the average a bit.</p>
<p>Tisk Tisk Tisk
for the school with the most laid back student body but behind closed doors they study like they’re going to die. <em>SneezelaidbackatmosphereSneeze</em></p>
<p><em>Shaking my head</em></p>
<p>I am also impressed by the difficulty of getting into Stanford. I recently was disappointed when I wrote a letter for someone (from CA) who did not get into Stanford but got in everywhere else including HYP. A loss to Stanford. I still cannot figure out what they were thinking.</p>
<p>One reason may be Stanford gets so many California applications that it may actually be especially hard if you are from California. Most other elite schools do not get so many applicants from their own state. If anyone knows the statistics please post them.</p>
<p>For anyone worrying about Stanford undergrad, do not forget you will get another chance at the Grad level.</p>
<p>no i hav no respect for stnford you want interesting a kid in my yr 4.0 unwieghted 2140 was brilliant a great guy was the founder of of his own online shopping site ,built a robot, buitlk a better robot had mad ec mad leader shp psition he appplioed ea was deffered and later rejected . However th a.a witha 2000 3.6 with no real interestiung ecs or at all i think got in standorrd admission bs …i hav no repect for that i hav more respect foru mcih which has dne away with affirmativbe action and aslo cornel which took the aformentioned brilliant guy…</p>
<p>so there…</p>
<p>no i hav no respect for stnford [grammar]you want interesting a kid in my yr 4.0[grammar] unwieghted [grammar]2140 was brilliant a great guy was the founder of of his own online shopping site ,built a robot,[grammar] buitlk [grammar]a better robot had mad ec mad leader[grammar] shp psition he appplioed ea was deffered and later rejected . However th a.a witha 2000 3.6 with no real interestiung ecs or at all i think got in standorrd admission bs …i hav no repect for that i hav more respect foru mcih which has [/color]dne away with affirmativbe action and aslo cornel which took the aformentioned brilliant guy…</p>
<p>My brain hurts.</p>
<p>A small portion of Stanford’s undergraduate population consists of highly competitive athletes. Stanford’s athletic program is so incredibly strong it has won the Director’s Cup, given to the best overall athletic department, for the past 13 years.</p>
<p>Stanford does everything it can to recruit athletes who are academically on par with the rest of its student population. However, competing with the likes of Texas, Michigan, USC, etc. is not easy and sometimes it has to accept a few top notch athletes who don’t have 99% percentile SAT scores.</p>
<p>This pretty much sums up the slightly lower range of SAT scores that Stanford has compared to HYP. There is no wide-scale policy of legacy preference, minority preference, weird EC preference, etc. While it is true that Stanford is a bit more willing than HYP to de-emphasize SAT scores, that affects only a tiny portion of acceptances/rejections.</p>
<p>Now whether you support the athletic policy is a personal preference. For me, I’d rather dedicate a small portion for world-class athletes. Cal Tech can have the small number of 1600 book worms that might get rejected b/c of this.</p>
<p>World-class athletics = sports events that are actually worth watching = cheering for your favorite teams with your pals = building Stanford spirit and pride = bonding with your classmates = having more friends and connections = being happier :-)</p>
<p>God, my brain hurts too after reading that message by mavman. Do people intentionally misspelled words?</p>
<p>“Do people intentionally misspelled words?”</p>
<p>lol</p>
<p>What I find funny is how the University of Texas tries to make itself look like the athletic equal of Stanford. I think two or three Texas football players have been arrested in the past six months, one being for robbery or burglary.</p>
<p>Stanford is more respected than Brown, which is supposedly an Ivy League school, so I’d expect Stanford to look for more well-rounded applicants.</p>