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September 18, 2026

Writing the supplemental “Why this major” essay sounds like a cakewalk for approximately 4% of high school seniors, those lucky few who’ve known their purpose since kindergarten. For most,...

September 17, 2026

Colleges publish the GPAs of the students they enroll. Those numbers are not as comparable as they look, and the most selective schools often do not publish them at...

September 11, 2026

Students applying to college this year will inevitably confront the community essay. In fact, most students will end up responding to several community essay prompts for different schools. For...

September 10, 2026

Fulbright publishes the application count behind every institution’s grant total. Almost nobody looks at that column. On February 3, 2026, the Fulbright Program named 114 colleges and universities as...

September 3, 2026

Seventy-two percent of Washington and Lee undergraduates belong to a fraternity or sorority. At New York University the figure is 2 percent for men and 5 percent for women....

August 26, 2026

Nonresidents make up 78 percent of the entering class at the University of Vermont and 3 percent at the University at Buffalo. Both are state flagships. This measures how...

August 21, 2026

In August 2026, two universities raised their income lines within a week of each other. Rice announced free tuition for families earning up to $200,000, beginning with students entering...

August 21, 2026

Villanova University’s acceptance rate has fallen to roughly 27%, well below where it stood a decade ago. Admitted students post strong test scores, and you typically need mostly A’s...

August 21, 2026

Admission is highly competitive at Wake Forest University, a mid-sized private school in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. They accept roughly one-fifth of applicants, and standards are high. Nearly 70% of...

August 21, 2026

Yale’s acceptance rate of roughly 4.6% for the Class of 2029 is not the type of number you want to glide past with blind optimism. It is not our...

August 21, 2026

Founded in 1693, the College of William & Mary is the second-oldest institution of higher learning in the United States. With an acceptance rate in the mid-30s, W&M is...

August 21, 2026

For the Class of 2028, the WashU acceptance rate remained low at just 12%. As Washington University in St. Louis continues marching toward the single-digit admit rate club, it’s...

August 21, 2026

Virginia Tech’s acceptance rate does not yet strike fear into the hearts of prospective applicants the way some peer institutions’ do, but it has tightened considerably in recent years....

August 20, 2026

The University of Pennsylvania accepted 40% of applicants back in 1980. In recent cycles, that figure has fallen to roughly 4%. Those wanting to join the Quaker campus a...

August 20, 2026

When applying to a school like the University of Southern California, it is important to grasp that their recent acceptance rate is lower than Harvard’s back in the late...

August 20, 2026

In forming its most recent class, the University of Michigan received a record 108,666 first-year applications, part of a record 115,125 total including transfer candidates. For historical comparison, there...

August 20, 2026

Short version: UVA has no supplemental essay for the vast majority of applicants. The only exception is the School of Nursing, which retains a single short answer. Everyone else...

August 20, 2026

Short version, and the only thing most readers came here for: Tulane no longer has a supplemental essay. The “Why Tulane?” question has been paused for the 2026-27 admissions...

August 20, 2026

The University of Texas at Austin is one of the top public universities in the United States, in the same league as the most popular UC campuses, UVA, UNC-Chapel...

August 20, 2026

With an acceptance rate in the neighborhood of 5-6%, Vanderbilt has become one of the most selective schools in the United States. Roughly 47,000 applicants now compete for about...