I am curious how these numbers compare to previous years. Is 7% of applicants a normal acceptance rate? Did they receive more applications than usual? Over time, how have these numbers changed? It would be more useful to present these numbers in a context.

Curious: check out the last line of the story. 7.2% last year. Not a LOT of context, but something...

May take a bunch off their waitlist. So many kids are putting out so many apps now and they can only attend one university, hence the waitlist situation nowadays.

Not saying this happens at Stanford, or other highly selective universities, but in "some" less selective colleges, they have boosted their national rankings considerably in the last few years by simply not "accepting" as many qualified applicants and dropping them down to "waitlist" status. It changes the college's yield, making it appear more desirable and more competitive. In turn, it attracts a stronger applicant pool the next year, trending its scores upwards etc.--even if the highly qualified only applied to it as an additional back-up school, it worked to gain stronger applicants.

Though the more qualified applicant will still more than likely select the more prestigious institution if accepted, a few will arrive on their campus--maybe for financial aid purposes, honor student placement, etc. Regardless, the university has successfully elevated its rank and popularity by making this adjustment. Their waitlist, now deep and strong, is loaded with overly anxious applicants just waiting for a last-minute reprieve. Clever strategy--misleading, but clever.

This change, along with extraordinary large pool of students applying to college, has definitely narrowed the playing field on acceptances for our kids. Hopefully, we can de-emphasize the rankings and simply celebrate the victory of attending college at all.

Curious - do you know of anyone who has ever applied overseas to a university, like Oxford or University of London (for undergrad, not for grad or Rhodes Scholarship? Many foreign students apply here and I never hear of anyone pursuing undergrad studies overseas.

The acceptance rate is simply a matter of how many applications are received. Stanford enrolls about 1600-1700 each year. From previous years they know what percentage of admits will turn down their offer, so they estimate how many they need to admit to end up at 1600-1700. They usually waitlist over 1000. Few on the waitlist will end up being admitted. Most are waitlisted for diplomatic reasons - they are legacies, parents donated lots of money, older sibling is a current student, graduating from one of their feeder prep schools, etc. Let's them save face by telling their classmates they are still being considered until summer when no one cares any longer.

Sarah, I am pretty sure every university wants to uptick its academic ranking. So don't blame "some" universities which have successfully implement ways to achieve it. In fact, no one is prohibiting the same methods to be used by anyone. Only the real good universities stand out from the competition.