Ivy League institutions mailed out a record number of dreaded thin envelopes this week for the Class of 2009.
Meanwhile, schools across the Ancient Eight reported that the qualifications of their accepted students broke virtually every record in the books, including SAT scores so high that the test may have lost significance in decisions.
Although the number of high- quality applications continues to rise, the number of first-year spots at top schools has remained nearly unchanged, and acceptance rates have plummeted.
While Dartmouth's final acceptance rate -- including both early and regular admissions -- hit an all-time low of 16.8 percent, it still pales in comparison to the rates of some peer institutions.
The acceptance rates of Harvard and Yale were below ten percent, while Stanford and Princeton each accepted a shade over a tenth of their applicants. The College's admissions rate for its larger-than-usual regular decision pool hit a record low of 15 percent, surpassing the University of Pennsylvania's new low of 16 percent in that same category.
UPenn's average SAT score was a surprisingly low 1434, a number apparently so modest that it required an explanation.
"If we made decisions based on SAT scores alone the averages would be higher, but we are obviously looking at a lot of other variables in the students' records," said Willis Stetson, dean of admissions at the University of Pennsylvania.
Dartmouth Dean of Admissions Karl Furstenberg reported an average SAT score of 1461 for the College's admitted class. The predominance of impressive scores has made the test weigh less heavily in the minds of admissions officers in recent years because most are so high that the differences between the scores is often insignificant, Furstenberg said.
While the talented pool of accepted students seems promising, schools must now worry about how many will matriculate in the fall.
Dartmouth's yield is expected to be around 50 percent, while much of the Ivy League plans on yields of upwards of 60 percent. Yale, despite a slight dip in the number of regular decision applications received, actually expects its yield to jump two percent from last year.
Seventy percent of students accepted at Yale are expected to enroll at the school next fall, according to an article in the Yale Daily News.
Dartmouth accepted a markedly high percentage of students who did not identify themselves as Caucasian, with notable jumps in the percentage of accepted Asian, African-American and Native-American students.
Dartmouth surpassed even the University of Pennsylvania in the percentage of students of color in the accepted class.
Dartmouth's total applicant pool of 12,757 was the largest in its history, an impressive accomplishment in a year when many institutions, including Yale and Penn, ended up short of record highs. Whereas Brown University's applicant pool increased to 16,908, Stanford and Harvard remained at the top, with both receiving more than 20,000 applications.
