04-03-2014, 04:30 AM
I think this whole focus on the admission rate as a fraction of applications is misguided. It's not like the schools pick a random sample out of the applications so if more people apply your chances are lower. (Maybe I'm wrong there. I could conceive of a government-run university being required to set a particular standard and then hand out admissions by randomly sampling the set of students meeting those qualifications. Gosh, I hope the Calif. legislature doesn't see this.)
Stanford admits about 2000-2600 a year and winds up with about 1500-1800 enrollments, dating back to 1970 (or further). (I only sampled some years, not all that range.) Instead of figuring a rate with the denominator being the number of applications, consider a rate figured against the number of US high school graduates. Since 1970, that number has grown from about 2.9M to 3.3M (there was a decrease during the middle of that period with the post-war baby boomers or their children lifting either end of that period). About 0.052% of US high school graduates got into Stanford in 1970. About 0.046% of that group got into Stanford in 2013. So, the chances of your children getting in is only about 8% worse than your chances were (given only the criteria that they were a US high school graduate).
That said, the fact that Stanford may not be able to distinguish which ~0.05% are the best does mean the increased applications probably result in more variance as to whether one of the best (by whatever measure Stanford wants to use) students actually get in.
Another way to look at the numbers is that 38,828 people applied (non-resident aliens included), when about 3.3M graduated from US high school that year, or close to 1.2% of all US high school graduates applied to Stanford. That would have meant that my Texas high school's baseball starting 9 could have all applied, and there still would have been room for me to apply and be under that average.
If the ante (ie, admissions fees) were raised for betting on being accepted, then there'd be fewer applications and a higher admissions rate (probably missing some that should have gotten in). If lowered, there'd be more applications and a lower admissions rate (at greater expense to Stanford for a possibly better set of students). But about the same number would wind up attending Stanford.
Sources include
http://ucomm.stanford.edu/cds/2013
http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2002/2002382.pdf
http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=372
http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d07/t...07_100.asp
https://alumni.stanford.edu/get/page/mag...e_id=32005
As for the comments about athletes, I think most high-achieving athletes (across the breadth of sports) are good students. There is an overlap of perseverance, intelligence, and good health. In most sports, athletes have to deal with other people (good & bad) and with hardships, both of which prepare them better than "book worms".
The relation between high school graduates and the choice of colleges they apply to is probably a lot like the social matching phenomenon. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matching_hypothesis) Or, maybe, the students & the college they wind up at is probably more like that. The former is probably more like the attempts to form social relationships (ie, dating).
Stanford admits about 2000-2600 a year and winds up with about 1500-1800 enrollments, dating back to 1970 (or further). (I only sampled some years, not all that range.) Instead of figuring a rate with the denominator being the number of applications, consider a rate figured against the number of US high school graduates. Since 1970, that number has grown from about 2.9M to 3.3M (there was a decrease during the middle of that period with the post-war baby boomers or their children lifting either end of that period). About 0.052% of US high school graduates got into Stanford in 1970. About 0.046% of that group got into Stanford in 2013. So, the chances of your children getting in is only about 8% worse than your chances were (given only the criteria that they were a US high school graduate).
That said, the fact that Stanford may not be able to distinguish which ~0.05% are the best does mean the increased applications probably result in more variance as to whether one of the best (by whatever measure Stanford wants to use) students actually get in.
Another way to look at the numbers is that 38,828 people applied (non-resident aliens included), when about 3.3M graduated from US high school that year, or close to 1.2% of all US high school graduates applied to Stanford. That would have meant that my Texas high school's baseball starting 9 could have all applied, and there still would have been room for me to apply and be under that average.
If the ante (ie, admissions fees) were raised for betting on being accepted, then there'd be fewer applications and a higher admissions rate (probably missing some that should have gotten in). If lowered, there'd be more applications and a lower admissions rate (at greater expense to Stanford for a possibly better set of students). But about the same number would wind up attending Stanford.
Sources include
http://ucomm.stanford.edu/cds/2013
http://nces.ed.gov/pubs2002/2002382.pdf
http://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=372
http://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d07/t...07_100.asp
https://alumni.stanford.edu/get/page/mag...e_id=32005
As for the comments about athletes, I think most high-achieving athletes (across the breadth of sports) are good students. There is an overlap of perseverance, intelligence, and good health. In most sports, athletes have to deal with other people (good & bad) and with hardships, both of which prepare them better than "book worms".
The relation between high school graduates and the choice of colleges they apply to is probably a lot like the social matching phenomenon. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matching_hypothesis) Or, maybe, the students & the college they wind up at is probably more like that. The former is probably more like the attempts to form social relationships (ie, dating).