What Ivy League acceptance rates really mean (fun with statistics!)

Over the past several decades, acceptance rates at the most selective United States colleges and universities have dropped dramatically. In the mid-1990s, for example, Yale University had an acceptance rate of around 18% for freshman applicants, whereas its freshman acceptance rate in 2017 was only one-third as high. Assuming that acceptances rates for the high school class of 2018 are similar to those for the class of 2017, all freshman applicants to Yale during the 2017-2018 admissions cycle will compete in a pool from which approximately 6% of freshman applicants are accepted. Which of the following would most weaken the conclusion of this passage? (A) Applicants who apply to Yale through Single Choice Early Action are accepted at far lower rates than they were in the mid-1990s. (B) There is a significant difference in the acceptance rates of Single Choice Early Action and Regular Decision Yale applicants. (C) The most competitive applicants to Yale often gain admission to multiple Ivy League schools. (D) A smaller percentage of students apply to Yale through Single Choice Early Action than apply Regular Decision. (E) The demographic makeup of Yales freshman class has changed significantly over the past several decades. Before I go into the explanation, Im going to take a little detour into a recent Washington Post Education article by Jeffrey Selingo. Most of the article is devoted to rehashing how grades are scores are not longer sufficient to get into a top schools, how the most selective schools have become even more selective, yadda yadda yadda. About halfway through the article, though, Selingo starts to dig into the actual significance of the jaw-droppingly low admissions statistics that the most selective colleges seem to post each year, and things start to get interesting. As Selingo points out, the admissions figures that schools release are based on both early and regular decision which typically have very different acceptance rates, with rates being much higher in the earlier round (or, in some cases, multiple rounds): [C]alculating the acceptance rate is not as simple as dividing the number of students who applied by those who were accepted. It’s a number that schools have easily manipulated in two ways. First, colleges have boosted the denominator in that calculation by purchasing names of test takers and employing business-like marketing techniques to encourage applications from students they have no intention of ever accepting. Second, some elite schools have created multiple application cycles with binding commitments known as â€Å"early decision,† which in some cases fills half their classes. But when colleges release their acceptance rates, the number they announce blends all the various cycles together, including regular admissions Take Vanderbilt University as an example. It fills 54 percent of its incoming class through two rounds of early decision. To most students and parents that might sound like they still have plenty of spots to parcel out in the regular round. But remember, the vast majority of applications that colleges receive — and then later boast about  Ã¢â‚¬â€ come through regular decision. In Vanderbilt’s case, the regular round yields only around 500 students from more than 25,000 applications. (Note that this last sentence is potentially misleading as well: yields and accepts are two different things. in 2017 Vanderbilt accepted 2,382 students out of 27,841 applicants, for an admit rate of 8.6% not the 2% implied in the article. Still, thats a very low rate.) So that question I posed earlier? The answer is (B): the assertion that all students are competing in a pool from which approximately 6% of all applicants will be accepted ignores the fact that Single Choice Early Action (SCEA) and Regular Decision applicants have two very different acceptance rates. Although the overall acceptance rate is around 6% (6.3% to be exact), the trick is that there are actually two pools: one with an extremely competitive but not insane acceptance rate (15.5%), and one in which very few applicants have a realistic chance of getting in (4.6%). At Penn, which is notorious for accepting a large percentage of its class early, the difference between the Early Action acceptance rate (25.2%) and the Regular Decision acceptance rate (7.3%) is nearly 18 points. And at Harvard, the RD acceptance rate is only 3.5%, as compared to a perfectly humane 21.1% for SCEA applicants. When hooked status is factored in, the playing field becomes even more competitive. Although some of the strongest applicants do of course apply ED, many hooked students wait to apply RD precisely because they can afford to do so. Penn is clear that legacy applicants lose their advantage if they dont apply ED, but a student whose parents attended Harvard is given the same advantage RD as ED. So basically, whats going on is that ED is the round in which more or less normal but still very high achieving applicants have a not implausible shot at getting accepted, whereas RD is the round in which most of the acceptances go to kids who are either hooked or off-the-charts exceptional in some way. For nice, typical 1500-scoring class president/yearbook editor/captain-of-the-baseball team applicants from average suburban public high schools, the RD acceptance rate at the top Ivies is probably more like 1-2%. Of course there are schools like MIT, which makes a deliberate effort to keep Early and RD acceptance rates more or less equivalent, but among the uber-elite, they are the exception. Then theres the actual percentage of the class thats filled early. Penn, which has binding ED, accepts 53% of its class early. One major reason for this is to protect yield the lower the RD yield (that is, the more students a school is likely to lose to a more prestigious competitor), the larger the percent of its class a school will be tempted to lock in by December. The reality is that most Penn/Harvard cross-admits are going to pick Harvard, and Penn knows it will lose a good number of its RD admits in the spring. Accepting more students early is a way to keep yield rate artificially high, which in turn helps it preserve a high USNWR ranking. Conversely, that is why Harvard and Yale can afford to have non-binding SCEA. The majority of admits to those school will ultimately enroll, regardless of where they are ultimately admitted, so protecting yield rates is less of a concern. If a small percentage of students admitted to Harvard in December ultimately decide theyd be happier at Stanford, Harvard can be generous and give them that option. For students who have been groomed for the Ivy League more or less since birth and arent applying for financial aid, all this doesnt pose too much of a problem. And incidentally, it poses less of a problem for the very poorest (first-generation) applicants than one might think: top colleges actively seek such students, and most can afford to meet their financial full need if they manage to get in. The problem is for applicants in the middle: the ones who might get enough money to attend a top school if accepted, but who really need to compare financial aid packages and maybe see whether they can pick up a full-ride merit scholarship somewhere. Unfortunately, as things currently stand, theres no easy solution. There are too many players, too many variables, and too much riding on the outcomes for things to change anytime soon. The bottom line, though, is that the next time you pick up a college guidebook and check the acceptance rate, you shouldnt automatically think, Oh, school x accepts 27% of its applicants. Thats not too bad Ill probably be fine. Go online and find out how many applicants are accepted early, how many spots are left over for RD applicants, and how many apply in each round. Unless its your absolute #1 choice and youre planning to apply early, those are the numbers you really need to go by.

To Obey or Disobey The Role of Obedience in the Iliad and Genesis 1-25 - Literature Essay Samples

Even though they were written in the same period of time, the Iliad (written c. 700 BC) and Genesis (compiled between 900 and 400 BC) exhibit many differences in their concepts of obedience. While the Iliad often condones men who disobey, Genesis condemns any man who does not obey the word of God with a harsh punishment. The contrasting ideas of obedience in the two books is important and relevant for the reader today in the light that Genesis has become the cornerstone for a major world religion while the Iliad has remained only at the epic poetry level.Obedience in Genesis is clearly a paramount and straightforward concept. Throughout this book, God creates men who disobey him and are therefore punished. Those who do not disobey him are saved from his wrath. The idea of disobedience is embodied by Adam and Eve. The first man and the first woman demonstrate that it is human nature to disobey, and that God does not like mistakes. There is nothing in Genesis that suggests that God adm ires the rebel or the free-thinker; he does not admire Adam and Eve for their boldness and courage to disobey God. Instead, God expects a blind faith and obedience from men to carry out God ¹s demands.Blind faith is exemplified in Genesis by those who are eventually exulted by God, specifically Noah and Abraham. Genesis does not directly state why Noah was the only man alive who  ³found favor in the sight of the Lord ² (Gen. 6. 8) but the reader can safely assume that Noah has always been obedient of God. In any case, Noah immediately obeys God ¹s orders to build an ark (Gen. 6. 22), even though this ark would symbolize Noah ¹s belief in the destruction of the rest of mankind. Noah ¹s blind faith in God is rewarded greatly because Noah becomes the new Adam, or a symbol of the rebirth of mankind. God says to Noah  ³Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth ² (Gen. 9.1). This is Noah ¹s compensation for his obedience to God ¹s orders.Likewise, when God orders the sacrifice of Isaac, the Lord is met with the same unwavering faith and obedience from Abraham. When God asks Abraham to sacrifice Isaac, he uses a tone which can be described as taunting, as though he is trying to anger Abraham so that he will disobey God. When God says  ³Take your son, your only son Isaac, who you love ² (Gen. 22. 2) the reader can see that God emphasizes to Abraham that Isaac is his only son and that Abraham loves his son. Despite the fact that it appears as though God is mocking him, Abraham does not question his command. Instead, he sets off to kill his son, and is stopped by an angel right before the knife cuts into Isaac. For his unquestioning devotion Abraham is also granted many descendants by God.Unlike Genesis, the Iliad is much less clear as to whether disobedience is a completely evil concept. When the gods are made angry by the acts of humans, they are much less straightforward about why they are angry than the God in Genesis. For example, in Book One, when Apollo is angered because Agamemnon has not accepted the ransom for Chryse ¹s daughter, he does not speak directly to Agamemnon about it. Instead, Apollo shoots plague-inflicted arrows upon the Argives for nine days. When the men want to know what they have done wrong to anger the gods, they cannot ask the gods directly. Instead they must rely on men who can interpret the signs of birds, in this case, Kalchas ( 1.69). Since Kalchas is a mere human, however, he is subject to the doubt and questionings of other humans. After he has told the Greeks why the plague has been inflicted upon them, Agamemnon still doubts him and wants to disobey his suggestions. Agamemnon attempts to discredit Kalchas by sneering  ³Seer of evil: never yet have you told me a good thing ² (,1.106). The indirect relationship between gods and humans makes it difficult for the human characters, as well as the reader, to discern what the gods consider to be disobedience and what they attribute to human ignorance.In Genesis, however, ignorance is no excuse for not obeying the law. Even though Eve has been tricked into eating from the forbidden tree, God does not have compassion for her ignorance. Instead he curses women forever with difficult childbirth and submission to men (Gen. 3. 16). In a way, Achilles ¹ disobedience of Agamemnon also leads to punishment. Since Achilles refuses to fight because of his anger at Agamemnon, his best friend, Patroklos is killed. If Achilles had exhibited the blind faith in Agamemnon that Noah and Abraham did in Genesis, his best friend would not have been killed by Hektor. In both Genesis and the Iliad, however, the disobedient still reap some rewards. Even though she has disobeyed God, Eve is still made the mother of the human race. Even though he is responsible for the death of his best friend, Achilles still achieves kleos.In both Genesis and the Iliad the lack of foresight by those who are supposed to be the rulers is evident. If Aga memnon had known that Achilles was going to be disobedient, even when Achilles saw the death and destruction of his countrymen, Agamemnon might have hesitated before talking Achilles ¹ war prize away from him. In Book Nine of the Iliad, Agamemnon tries to apologize by sending ambassadors to Achilles so that he will come back to the battle, but Achilles refuses. Achilles ¹ absence in the battles of the Iliad causes Agamemnon considerable strife and regret.The reader can infer from Genesis that God also feels regret from his lack of foresight. God did not expect that Eve would disobey him, and therefore he placed the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the Garden of Eden. Since Adam and Eve eat from this tree mankind gained the knowledge of good and evil, and throughout the rest of The Bible, this knowledge is always causing God problems. God is so concerned about the disobedience of Adam and Eve that he sends them away from the Garden of Eden because he is afraid they wil l eat from the tree of life and live forever (Gen. 3. 22-23).If there is one symbol which represents disobedience in Genesis it is the serpent which tricks Eve into eating from the forbidden tree. The use of a non-human character (i.e. the serpent) to instigate evil suggests that disobedience was not originally a human characteristic. After Adam and Eve gain the knowledge of good and evil, disobedience becomes a distinctly human trait, and human energy is concentrated on how to obey and to not give in to temptation. In the Iliad, evil is a characteristic of the gods as well as the mortals. For example, Hera is always conjuring up ways to trick and disobey her husband, Zeus. Hera and Athena are constantly trying to do harm to their rival, Aphrodite.Since the God in Genesis only favors those who are most obedient, he offers a contrast to the Greek gods, who favor the men who are the strongest, wisest, most beautiful, and most warlike. This variance in what the gods and God favor is im portant because it helps to explain why the language in the Iliad is so different from the language in Genesis. While much of the Iliad concentrates on describing the physical and mental characteristics of the characters, Genesis rarely gives details about its characters ¹ traits. For example, it is often mentioned by Homer that Achilles is admired by the gods because he is the strongest of men, that Odysseus is favored by Athena because he is wise, or that Paris is favored by Aphrodite because of his beauty. In Genesis, however, God favors men only because they are obedient and fearful of him. For example, there is no physical description of Adam, Eve, Noah or Abraham. Each of these characters is favored or not favored by God according to his or her deeds. In fact, the intellectual thoughts or emotions of these characters are rarely mentioned directly. Because of this the book of Genesis implies that the physical and mental capacities of an individual are not important; all that matters is obedience and submission to God.In conclusion, a reader can determine the relationship between the character of a book and God by looking at how much emphasis the author of the book places on obedience. The characters in the Iliad fear the gods, but it seems like the gods in the Iliad are more concerned with receiving respect or honor from humans rather than blind obedience. If one of the roles of religion is to make people live in fear of doing wrong and to directly obey the word of God then it is obvious why Genesis is the considered by many as the introduction to the handbook on how to live.