They don't know what the yield will be with the increase in apps. I would guess that they waitlist more students to see how the yield shakes out.
OT: Applications for Rutgers NB have increased almost 40% for Fall 2024
- Thread starter RUDeac
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The quality of the education and fit for the student? It worked for me and my kids, rankings be damned.
The numbers school puts out is in favor of Rutgers. Think I trust that source more.
It is positive when the parochial school kids are paying attention. I went to catholic school and only 3 of us in my class went to RU. Rutgers has not been am aspirational school, especially for private school kids. The increased rankings and lower acceptance rate from increased common app activity helps perception. Competitive sports does not hurt.
Do you know the avg number of Delbarton students that attend RU? I am guessing not too high, but positive step if they are applying.
As other posters said, acceptance rate is a big factor for the kids in determining the prestige of a school. Now that SAT/ACT is not a factor at so many schools, it is probably a bigger factor. Lack of SAT/ACT also increases the applicant pool from students who have good grades but are not great standardized test takers.
Northeastern is the king of marketing to improve perception.
They are now in the top 10 of college apps received. Two of my RU friends have kids that went to Northeastern.
UCLA (146k apps), UCSD, CAL, UCIrvine, CalState LongBeach, NYU (120k apps)), UCSB, Northeastern (94k apps), UCDavis
Comparing to other B1G schools
From 2022-23
Michigan
84k apps
15k admitted
7k enrolled
OSU
65k apps
34k admitted
8k enrolled
RU
42k apps
28k admitted
8k enrolled
RU acceptance rate will decrease to be in the 40% range which is more in line with other competitive big ten schools. Kids definitely use acceptance rate in determining how "good" a school is. Reality is, that it is more about how 'popular' a school is. ie: Northeastern. They did a great job of increasing the popularity of their school.
Northeastern is the king of marketing to improve perception.
They are now in the top 10 of college apps received. Two of my RU friends have kids that went to Northeastern.
UCLA (146k apps), UCSD, CAL, UCIrvine, CalState LongBeach, NYU (120k apps)), UCSB, Northeastern (94k apps), UCDavis
Comparing to other B1G schools
From 2022-23
Michigan
84k apps
15k admitted
7k enrolled
OSU
65k apps
34k admitted
8k enrolled
RU
42k apps
28k admitted
8k enrolled
RU acceptance rate will decrease to be in the 40% range which is more in line with other competitive big ten schools. Kids definitely use acceptance rate in determining how "good" a school is. Reality is, that it is more about how 'popular' a school is. ie: Northeastern. They did a great job of increasing the popularity of their school.
Rutgers is far from an easy school and some majors are down right impossible. The provincials who think otherwise so uninformed.
For a lot of kids in NJ, Rutgers is not an aspirational school. RU hasn't really had to work hard at getting quality students because NJ is so densely populated. There are lots of in state students to fill each class. Many top NJ students would not even apply to RU. At least your daughter and her friend group applied. That's a step in the right direction for RU. 😂
NJ just have a lot of smart kids. RU’s issue is proximity. Too close to home.
Yep.
And many of them have options. Some in this thread might not agree with those options, but 1.) they’re not your kids and 2.) you’re not 17.
If they all got in then they had an average SAT of about 1300. That's a pretty smart friend group.
yea her traveling section of kids was basically 1-20 in class rank. And I don’t think people who haven’t done this recently understand how easy common app makes it. You’d be stupid as a NJ kid not to apply if it’s even a 1 % chance you would go
if RU really wants to shift the acceptance rate, a way to do that is to review apps differently.
Other large flagships with schools within the university have students apply to their one top choice major, and maybe allow a second choice.
For Rutgers, every kid gets 3 selections in 3 different schools of varying selectivity, and they will allow students to add more. I have students that apply to 6 schools within Rutgers, fishing for an acceptance. In the past, they often hit on SEBS, but I am seeing more denies there this year.
PSU allows one choice only, and then students are shunted to a Commonwealth campus. It’s why over 50% of the apps from my high school don’t get into UP. They’d have a better shot if they could just fish for a program that would accept them, like they do at Rutgers.
As for this year’s results, lots of tears and disbelief from students (and parents) who thought they were getting in. Most are not a surprise to me, because I had some pretty good kids waitlisted last year, but there are some pretty strong students who were not admitted coming out of EA.
Of course, this will do nothing but feed the frenzy next year, as it has with other schools that have increased selectivity.
Other large flagships with schools within the university have students apply to their one top choice major, and maybe allow a second choice.
For Rutgers, every kid gets 3 selections in 3 different schools of varying selectivity, and they will allow students to add more. I have students that apply to 6 schools within Rutgers, fishing for an acceptance. In the past, they often hit on SEBS, but I am seeing more denies there this year.
PSU allows one choice only, and then students are shunted to a Commonwealth campus. It’s why over 50% of the apps from my high school don’t get into UP. They’d have a better shot if they could just fish for a program that would accept them, like they do at Rutgers.
As for this year’s results, lots of tears and disbelief from students (and parents) who thought they were getting in. Most are not a surprise to me, because I had some pretty good kids waitlisted last year, but there are some pretty strong students who were not admitted coming out of EA.
Of course, this will do nothing but feed the frenzy next year, as it has with other schools that have increased selectivity.
RUs 50th percentile is 1300, Clemson's 75th percentile is 1310. Also prep scholar says the average GPA for incoming freshmen at Clemson is 4.43… That would be better than MIT, Stanford and Duke. There's not a chance in hell that's correct. More likely it's an unweighted 3.43 and it's just a mistake.
If students are applying to RU with a 1300 SAT, they shouldn’t be. That’s in the bottom 25% of admitted students at Rutgers.
Current admission profile for RU: https://admissions.rutgers.edu/sites/default/files/2023-08/2023 Desk Reference Card-08172023_QR.pdf
I don’t have issues how people spend their money. My problem is they always come up with some lame excuse why they didn’t pick RU. Just say your kid didn’t want to go there. The worst excuse is Rutgers is so expensive.
1300 is not what it used to be. My daughter got 1480 and the conversation was should she submit or not. Crazy
That’s most competitive schools not because only kids submitting SAT’s are top scores looking for money
True. Most schools tell kids if you are not in the previous year middle 50%, don’t submit.
Proximity may be an issue for some kids that want to get away, but there are plenty of NJ kids applying to schools like NYU, Lehigh, Lafayette, Bucknell, Fordham that may be a similar distance from home.
I feel that the number of options within 4-5 hours is more of an issue for RU. Lots of competition out of state with all the schools within the radius of Boston, DC and Pittsburgh.
All of the Ivy league schools are within 5 hours of Rutgers. Historically, Ivy league and elite small liberal art colleges have been considered more prestigious than State Schools. Northeast is pretty snobbish about colleges.
There are plenty of kids from Atlanta that apply to UGA. Athens is only 1.5 hours away.
Most of those schools are apples to oranges. Kids who are Looking at small Patriot League schools usually don’t want huge state schools. It’s a totally different college experience. Neither is wrong or right but they are very different
NYU is like a world away vs RU. Urban schools in the city is not a comparable. RU’s other disadvantage is how they market to kids. They really make the school much bigger than it is.
Exactly which is why I don't compare Rutgers to like an NYU or a BC since they attract different students. Rutgers academic peers to me are major state universities like Purdue, Illinois, Wisconsin, Maryland, Washington, etc. That's why I care more about being #1 academically in the Northeast amongst public universities and #15 nationally amongst public universities.
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The point is that in other states the top kids with means don’t have all these options in their region, and have more of a tradition of going to the U which was always prestigious and the main game in the area. And in the Northeast a higher percent of the population has been going to college for generations, with a culture of going to elite schools. And Rutgers was very late to the game as the flagship school. All that contributes to deep seated perceptions about status and quality.
My daughter was being recruited by a D1 school and they tell their recruits not to submit anything under 1500. Anything less and you are only hurting your chances.
Schools are trying to prop up their numbers too. I was at a BU tour and they showed their avg incoming student. I almost got up and call BS. No effing way their avg was 4.4 GPA with 1500 SAT.
It is 90% common app. Any time a school changes to common app their applications soar. This has nothing to do with people realizing that private schools area ripoff or much of anything else. I knew before a single application was submitted this year that RU would have a massive increase.
when they say "student debt" i believe they are talking federal loans. Everyone knows that if you have a reasonable income you don't even qualify for federal loans. So it comes down to this...if you are low income, you won't come out with debt...but middle class and up will pay a very significant amount.
Those stats accurately represent my students who are accepted to BU post-Covid.
The reality is the last GPA averages are really pretty useless because everyone uses a different scales, and weighted GPAs are very inflated at many schools.
Colleges see through weighted GPAs via “honors” classes. But AP classes with AP test scores get credit. The student they showed took 7 AP classes. All of your students scored 1500+ and the best they can do is BU?
ETA I just looked up their 2027 class stats. Only 41% submitted scores and they don’t even post the range of scores and GPA is 3.8 to 4.0. US News shows middle 50 have a range of SAT scores of 1350 - 1500. Totally full of BS about their “average” student.
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The other thing is with SATs, most schools are now test optional. So if a kid doesn't have very high SAT scores, they aren't submitting...thus the average score for accepted students goes up significantly. The average SAT scores most schools show are not necessarily representative of what their actual classes averaged. The number is the average of the kids who submitted...and those were the high end numbers. Florida state universities are an exception....and some others...but it seems majority are test optional and so their SAT numbers are bloated.
Yes, the middle 50% is really the top 37.5% to 12.5% assuming only 50% submitted their scores.
Thanks, that has been pointed out. But when your name is Courtney, and your profile picture on X has a woman in the foreground, woman is not a terrible guess? 🤷♂️
Agree that they are very different types of schools. The point is that state schools in the southeast, Texas and West have always attracted the best and brightest students in their area. The state schools in the northeast have not. The Midwest is a mixed bag, but state schools in the big ten have had a good reputation.
Michigan, UNC Chapel Hill, UVA, GA
Tech are the big state schools that have historically had a good reputation in the northeast.
Now, more kids from the northeast want to go to "rah rah" schools. So NC State, South Carolina, Clemson, VaTech, UGA, Florida, FSU, Ole Miss, Alabama and Auburn are more popular than they used to be. Wisconsin, Indiana, Purdue, PSU, Maryland, Pitt, WVU have had a lot of interest from NJ students for a long time.
Little Jimmy could not get into Mich, UNC, UVA so Wisc, PSU, MD got more apps from NJ, then when those schools got popular, new ones emerged. I think that objectively, there probably isn't too much of difference academically between most of these schools. The majority of the kids that go to these schools could attend any of the other schools and be successful. There is a difference in popularity. There is a difference in perception of RU, SUNY, UMass, UConn from the students in their own state. In other states, students aspire to go their State U. In the northeast, not so much. I dont think that it is right or wrong, just different perspectives in different parts of the country.
Just replying to the statement that the RU issue is proximity. That is only an issue for some kids since so many choose schools that are not too far from home.
I do agree that RU has had crappy marketing. The different campuses is a deal breaker for a lot of people. In reality, they should promote that because you are hardly ever more than a 10min walk away from a dining hall, student center and library. That should be presented as an advantage vs other big schools. Each area fosters it's own community.
I just went through the process with my son and currently going through with my daughter. Was sure my some would choose RU due to affinity for Rutgers sports all his life. When it came to choosing, Rutgers presented itself very poorly. Too spread out,,,need to take buses….campuses generally look worn out and poorly planned…amenities don’t hold up to many other schools…and on and on. Now my daughter isn’t even considering RU. We don’t maker the school well and have not done a good job planning and improving facilities over time.
Totally bro, 18 year olds look at endowment and weather when choosing a college.
Paying for Southern Montclair has really warped you.
Pretty much all big schools have buses.
I don't believe NB has a high crime rate.
Certainly though if crime was an issue, you wouldn't expect to see a lot of Philly schools luring NJ kids, or Tulane, or lots of other places.
