Fairly shocking admissions news from UT

[epchick]

Originally Posted by srmom

Not commenting, just adding another piece to the puzzle of what's going on -

This is a letter to Texas high school counselors explaining why they are having to do away with the summer program.

The numbers are astounding!

http://bealonghorn.utexas.edu/docs/no.sfc.2009.pdf

Srmom, I have a question about this letter.

It says they admit 11,500 students during the summer & Fall. Is that combined enrollment, or is it 11,500 for the summer & 11,500 for the fall? That seems like a really low enrollment number, so does that not include top 10%?

I know this had been said before (i think it was in the Texas recruitment thread) but instead of doing away with the Top 10% rule, they should revise it to say that anyone who graduates from the Top 10% rule can be guaranteed admission to a public school, instead of any public school. Which means that they might not get admitted to UT (and UT can be more selective as to which & how many top 10%'ers they take) but they'll get admitted to a texas public school.

[PeppyGPhiB]

Originally Posted by epchick

Srmom, I have a question about this letter.

It says they admit 11,500 students during the summer & Fall. Is that combined enrollment, or is it 11,500 for the summer & 11,500 for the fall? That seems like a really low enrollment number, so does that not include top 10%?

Well, that's probably what they admit every year. 11,500 x 4 = 46,000. That is a HUGE undergraduate student body, and that doesn't even include kids that take a fifth or sixth year.

ETA: just re-read that 11,500 is the number admitted, not the number that enroll. Normally they admit that many across summer and fall, but this year they admitted that many just for fall due to the top-10% law. They only have capacity for 7,200 freshmen.

[Jimmy Choo]

Originally Posted by epchick

I know this had been said before (i think it was in the Texas recruitment thread) but instead of doing away with the Top 10% rule, they should revise it to say that anyone who graduates from the Top 10% rule can be guaranteed admission to a public school, instead of any public school. Which means that they might not get admitted to UT (and UT can be more selective as to which & how many top 10%'ers they take) but they'll get admitted to a texas public school.

As a non-Texan I have been reading this thread with interest. North Carolina doesn't have anything like this however it is always hotly debated why kids from our metro areas have to have such higher GPA's etc to get into UNC as opposed to the rest of the state. I quoted epchick's post b/c to me this would seem like the best solution. Unless you wanted to stay closer to home or had family ties to another Texas school I can't blame all the Top 10% students for picking UT. I know I sure would! But if you guarantee the student admissions and let the schools decide who they want at their institutions that seems like a more fair system. To this outsider it seems to me that the kids who are being penalized now are the kids in the metro areas. However you can't go back to the prior system b/c that seemed to penalize kids who weren't in a major metro area.

[epchick]

Originally Posted by Jimmy Choo

To this outsider it seems to me that the kids who are being penalized now are the kids in the metro areas. However you can't go back to the prior system b/c that seemed to penalize kids who weren't in a major metro area.

I think the kids that are getting penalized are the ones who come from academically rigorous school districts, and that is a shame. I get conflicted with this whole idea, but 1/2 of me agrees with srmom. It isn't fair that her son (who if you compare him with a top 10% student here, most likely has a higher gpa) might get the shaft and someone from the Top 10% in Bowie HS (a school here with low performance) gets the spot.

But then the other 1/2 of me is glad, because that was probably the only chance that top 10% student from Bowie gets to go to college. It is probably true that his GPA is probably closer to the 3.0 range, which isn't anywhere near Top 10% in an academically rigorous HS, but that's the reality in El Paso. You have the students that do exceptionally well (I graduated with a ~3.99 GPA--I got 1 B in my 4 years of school) and then you have the students who don't, and they might all be in the Top 10%.

It is true that a lot of students want to go to UT (I didn't, I would have preferred A&M, but I didn't apply to either) but it's obvious that soon it's not gonna happen. I don't think getting rid of the Top 10% rule is the answer, it just needs a little bit of tweaking.

[VandalSquirrel]

So what's the scoop on grade inflation and if there are effects on this 10% rule?

[epchick]

Originally Posted by VandalSquirrel

So what's the scoop on grade inflation and if there are effects on this 10% rule?

The Top 10% rule is a rule that every school has, and they rank the students from highest GPA to lowest GPA and thus get the Top 10% of the school. Like in my school, the Top 10% was 29 students.

IDK if this is what you mean, but AP classes greatly affect your GPA. For every Pre-AP class you take, you add 8 points to your final grade. And for every AP class you take, you add 10 points. For example, I didn't take Pre-AP Geometry or AP Chemistry, while the rest of my friends did. So it didn't matter that I maintained a grade of '100' for the entire year. My friend L, ended up with a 96 in AP Chemistry, but it became a 106 b/c of the AP points.

[VandalSquirrel]

Originally Posted by epchick

The Top 10% rule is a rule that every school has, and they rank the students from highest GPA to lowest GPA and thus get the Top 10% of the school. Like in my school, the Top 10% was 29 students.

IDK if this is what you mean, but AP classes greatly affect your GPA. For every Pre-AP class you take, you add 8 points to your final grade. And for every AP class you take, you add 10 points. For example, I didn't take Pre-AP Geometry or AP Chemistry, while the rest of my friends did. So it didn't matter that I maintained a grade of '100' for the entire year. My friend L, ended up with a 96 in AP Chemistry, but it became a 106 b/c of the AP points.

Somewhat, what if a school doesn't offer AP classes because it doesn't have the money or students to support it? Also I'm thinking of the "everyone gets a trophy (A) because everyone is a winner and if we don't have a bunch of winners we look bad" which we all know happens.

[Jimmy Choo]

Originally Posted by epchick

I think the kids that are getting penalized are the ones who come from academically rigorous school districts, and that is a shame. I get conflicted with this whole idea, but 1/2 of me agrees with srmom. It isn't fair that her son (who if you compare him with a top 10% student here, most likely has a higher gpa) might get the shaft and someone from the Top 10% in Bowie HS (a school here with low performance) gets the spot.

But then the other 1/2 of me is glad, because that was probably the only chance that top 10% student from Bowie gets to go to college. It is probably true that his GPA is probably closer to the 3.0 range, which isn't anywhere near Top 10% in an academically rigorous HS, but that's the reality in El Paso. You have the students that do exceptionally well (I graduated with a ~3.99 GPA--I got 1 B in my 4 years of school) and then you have the students who don't, and they might all be in the Top 10%.

It is true that a lot of students want to go to UT (I didn't, I would have preferred A&M, but I didn't apply to either) but it's obvious that soon it's not gonna happen. I don't think getting rid of the Top 10% rule is the answer, it just needs a little bit of tweaking.

Not to add more fuel to the fire but you said the Top 10% rule is the only chance kids from some schools have to go to college. Wouldn't it be more accurate to say that was their only chance to go to UT? I thought the 10% rule applied to all Texas public colleges/universities?