Trends in College Admissions: What We’re Seeing & Where We’re Headed

If you are in or approaching the college application process, you are probably eager to know what to expect as the admissions process seems to be changing year over year.

Read on for insights from the TBU team on what we’ve seen so far, and where we think admissions is headed –

TBU Managing Partner Lauren Dodington was recently interviewed for the College Database Find the Best Colleges in US | CollegeData article “7 College Admissions Trends to Watch in 2023.” We love diving deep in the data, watching the nuances of trends and anticipating where things are headed in the near future. Checkout the article for perspectives from Lauren & other admissions experts. Beyond these- here are three trends the team at TBU is keeping an eye on for the year ahead:

1. Test Optional Policies are likely here to stay.

Columbia University was the most recent of the ivies to announce that their test optional policy will remain in place going forward. We expect to see more colleges making announcements like these as they approach the expiration dates of their current policies. While more control and choice for applicants in how they present themselves is a good thing, we do eye this with a bit of skepticism. Colleges have benefited from astronomical increases in applications since adopting test optional policies in response to the Covid pandemic. We suspect many colleges are hesitant to let go of the gains in applications, and subsequent reduction in acceptance rates that these policies have yielded. This is to say, we do not expect it to get easier or less competitive for students to gain admission under test optional policies at highly selective schools.

2. Popularity of flagship public universities will continue to grow.

Several public universities have become wildly popular in recent years, taking schools that students had long considered likely or possible options into the reach category. We’ve noted these trends at places like the University of Wisconsin Madison and University of Washington Seattle. Both institutions have seen rapidly growing numbers of applications that are making them more selective than ever. This underscores the need to really investigate the most recent admissions rates and student profiles to realistically assess how competitive a college will be.

3. Expect colleges to ask for more creative ways for students to share who they are and express their character and personal qualities.

With the advent of ChatGPT and potential changes to admissions practices from the anticipated supreme court decision on affirmative action, we anticipate that colleges may embrace more out of the box application components. We might see more video submissions, changes to the supplemental questions a college asks, or opportunities for students to include a range of means of self-expression and representation on the application that go beyond traditional essay writing. What these might look like is as yet unknown, but we won’t be surprised for colleges to offer timed written responses to get more off-the-cuff writing, to have students provide vlogs or video messages, or to include visual representations of their passions, or interest in a college.

As decisions come in over the next few weeks, we will be rooting for all the students out there, and will look forward to providing you more perspective on what we are learning from the 2023 admissions cycle.

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