Acceptance rates are not a measure of selectivity. I’m sure you can imagine a country club, tells everyone “No blacks, no Indians, no Asians, no Latins, no Catholics, no Jews, no gays, no immigrants.” Last year, ten people applied for membership and nine got in, all white Anglo-Saxon Protestants with yearly incomes above 100K and net worth above 200K.

The club’s 90% acceptance rate says nothing about how selective it is. It would be wrong to say that because the acceptance rate is 90%, “it just is not that difficult to gain admission.”

SuperSub,

You are, of course, right about the math. In that case, half the students would go to schools with above average SAT scores. If those schools were also “selective”, it would mean that half the students had to deal with a selective admissions process.

Whatever. I tend to do a Reverse Groucho Marx: I want no part of a group that doesn’t want me as a member.

The top 10% rule means that the top 10% of the students of the lowest performing high school in the worst school district in the state are automatically admitted to state universities. Meanwhile, at the highest performing public schools, where the 11-20% may all be multiple-AP, 4.0+ students, those who don’t make the 10% cut are leaving the state and boosting the brainpower of other states’ universities. The result, IMHO, is rather a dumbing-down of the better public universities of Texas, as those who only squeaked in by virtue of the top 10% rule end up washing out and wasting a spot that could have gone to a more capable student.

However, I’m sure if you drop down to schools just outside the top 100… admissions rates will be well over 80% and SAT scores average. Schools just outside top 50 are still somewhat selective… but drop down another 30 spots, and it just is not that difficult to gain admission.

Rank 52 Yeshiva University 66.5% 1235
Rank 53 George Washington University 37.4% 1290
Rank 53 Ohio State University–Columbus 62.3% 1230
Rank 53 University of MD, CP 39.2% 1295
Rank 56 Boston University 54.3% 1270
Rank 56 University of Pittsburgh 55.4% 1260
Rank 58 Pepperdine University 34.4% 1230
Rank 58 Syracuse University 52.5% 1160
Rank 58 University of Georgia 55.6% 1230
Rank 61 Clemson University 53.8% 1220
Rank 61 Fordham University 46.8% 1230
Rank 61 Purdue University–West Lafayette71.5% 1160
Rank 61 Texas A&M University 70.1% 1205
Rank 61 University of Minnesota 52.5% 1250
Rank 66 Rutgers, 55.8% 1200
Rank 66 University of Connecticut 54.5% 1215
Rank 68 Southern Methodist University 49.7% 1240
Rank 68 University of Delaware 56.0% 1170
Rank 68 Worcester Polytechnic Institute 66.9% 1285
Rank 71 Brigham Young University–Provo 69.3% 1235
Rank 71 Indiana University–Bloomington 70.7% 1175
Rank 71 Michigan State University 70.0% 1140
Rank 71 U. of California–Santa Cruz 71.7% 1150
Rank 71 University of Iowa 82.3% 1195

Thanks, Richard–needs to be said and you said it well.

An acceptance rate above 50%, even “well above 50%,” doesn’t mean a school “will admit just about anyone.” For one thing, most people who don’t think they can get in don’t apply. It’s a waste of their time and money.

Your assertion about SAT scores doesn’t sound accurate. There are thousands of colleges and universities in the United States. It is mathematically unlikely that only 100 of them are more than “barely above average.” (But, hey, I could be wrong. I don’t have the figures.)