Out of a record-high pool of 30,932 applications to Yale this year, 1,935 students were offered acceptance and 1,361 students have chosen to matriculate to the University, making for a 70.3 percent yield — the highest in Yale’s recorded history. The yield rate rose by more than three percent from the 68.3 percent yield recorded for the class of 2017.
Dean of Undergraduate Admissions Jeremiah Quinlan said although he expected the yield to increase slightly because the University accepted more students in the Early Action round this year, the magnitude of the yield exceeded his office’s expectations.
The University accepted 735 students in the Early Action round in December, a rise from 649 last year. Both Quinlan and college counselors interviewed said students who apply early are more far more likely to attend the University.
For the first year, the Admissions Office also released the yield for the Regular Decision round. Of the 1,041 admitted students who applied in the regular decision round, approximately 596 students chose Yale, making for a yield rate of 57.1 percent.
Quinlan said that number, which for years has been calculated internally, is the highest on record. Because of the strong yield rate, he said, Yale will likely only take 10 to 15 students off its waitlist. In past years, Yale has fluctuated between taking any number of students — from zero to 100 — off of the waitlist.
“I’m hesitant to attribute [the rise in the yield] to anything specific because it’s a multi-year process,” Quinlan said. Still, he added that the last year has been a positive year for the University in the media, citing several professors’ Nobel Prize wins and the record $250-million gift to the University by Charles Johnson ’54 as two examples.
Although Quinlan originally said the yield numbers would not be publicized until the fall, he said he changed his mind and decided to release the numbers in order to highlight the progress Yale has made in attracting a more diverse incoming freshman class.
In a summit at the White House in January, University President Peter Salovey pledged Yale’s commitment to becoming a more accessible institution to high-achieving students from all backgrounds. Salovey pledged to expand or continue a number of initiatives including increasing the number of students who are finalists in the QuestBridge National College Match — a program that seeks to connect high-achieving students from low-income backgrounds to selective universities — by 50 percent to 80 students each year.
The class of 2018 nearly matched that commitment with 79 finalists in the program. 14 percent of the incoming freshmen are first-generation students, a rise from the average of 12 percent from the three prior classes. About 16 percent of eligible students in the incoming class will be receiving Pell Grants.
Yale’s announcement comes on the heels of similar yield increases at three of the five other Ivy League schools that have publicized their data thus far. Harvard maintained a record-high 82 percent yield rate but also accepted nearly 1,000 students in the early action round. Dartmouth and the University of Pennsylvania also recorded upticks in their yield rates to 54.5 percent and 66 percent respectively. Princeton and Brown registered slight drops. Neither Cornell nor Columbia have announced this year’s yield rate.
http://yaledailynews.com/blog/2014/05/13/yale-posts-record-high-yield-rate/
The have since corrected the story ti say that there ware only 1,361 preliminary matriculants, which with 1,935 admits means a yield rate of 70.3%.
ReplyDeleteBut they also now concede that 35 deferred admits were not counted i n the admit number - which they should have been. thus there were 1,970 admits, preliminarily, and 1,361 matriculants, pending wait list action and summer melt.
This means that the REAL preliminary yield is 69%
Higher yield at Yale this year could also be the reflection of the higher early admit rate at Harvard, which effectively reduced some of the H-Y cross-admits. A moderate increase in yield for Stanford should be expected.
ReplyDeleteNow I truly don't like the EA.
Of course Stanford also has those 100+ athletic scholarship recruits who get full rides and are compelled to attend. This makes for a bit of an asterisk in re the announced Stanford yield rate.
ReplyDeleteYou are correct, however. that the purpose of the EA programs, at least in part, is to reduce the number of cross-admit losses, thus raising everybody's yield rate.
It is very true that Stanford has those athletic scholarship recruits forever to boost its yield, but the hard fact is that Stanford's numbers are improving...the only number that Stanford is still behind is the yield, and Stanford still needs some time to catch up, certainly not through EA as it really screws up on the overall applications.
ReplyDeleteTo the NYC guy: The Stanford applicants offered athletic scholarships are not compelled to enroll at Stanford. They have until May 1 to make a decision like any other prospective student and can choose any college to enroll at even if they applied early admission to Stanford.
ReplyDeleteHarvard, Yale, and the other Ivy League schools offer admission to recruited athletes who would not otherwise be admitted. You can assume the vast majority of athletic admits to Harvard are going to go to Harvard if they are offered on the basis of sports.
I don't think "ucresearcher" understands the binding nature of the "letter of intent" which is signed long before May 1.
ReplyDeleteYou may say that S takes only 10% of its EA applications. But to see the impacts of EA to the matriculation yield, what actually matters is not this published rate, but the percentage of all the admits from the EA application pool, including the 10% EAs and the deferred who eventually got admitted during RA.
ReplyDeleteAny school, including S, could lower down its EA rates by pushing some of the EAs to the RA stage, without impacting its eventual yield. This is because deferring an EA decision is not going to affect applicant's desire level to matriculate this school. Suppose school "S" defers an EA applicant, then admits him during RA. If this applicant likes "S" so much, he will matriculate S, and the impact to the yield is none. If this applicant is not sure if "S" is definitely the school he will matriculate, he will apply for another school during RA regardless of the EA admission decision from "S". Therefore, the impact to yield is still none. Therefore, it is clear that a low EA rate does not negatively affect a school's matriculation yield. Stanford must know this, and it won't hurt its yield by publishing a low EA rate.
ReplyDeleteI think that what really is a "terrible" thing to do is to accept "too" many during EA, like what H did this year. It naturally kills the number of RA applications, like what happened at H, so the overall admit rate can not go lower. If my speculation is correct, H's higher EA admit rate this year did not do any favor to H but to Y and S as the cross-admits were greatly reduced, and hence S's and Y's yields improved significantly but H's yield stayed the same. Those EA kids probably would go to H anyway regradless, but were eliminated from S's and Y's application pools.
ReplyDeleteIt would be wise for H to accept less in EA this coming year.
Interesting strategic advice.
ReplyDeleteBut what outside observers can't know is who these early applicants are, and what their qualifications are. The early pools at these schools may differ somewhat in character. Harvard, for example, has a rather high percentage of the top SAT scorers nationally who apply early, and a disproportionately high fraction of "#1 in the class" etc. compared to most other schools. They can't turn all of them down.
Then there are the "likely letter" recipients for athletes to fill the rosters at a nation-leading 42 Division 1 varsity teams. Unlike Stanford or Duke, they can't rely on binding letters of intent and Athletic "scholarships" to fill these slots. The yield on such recruits is very high, but it is not 100%.