PSA: Article: Virginia Tech is Over-Enrolled

[Lanny]

Possibly this will be of interest to Virginia residents:

https://www.npr.org/2019/06/13/732117532/over-enrolled-virginia-tech-offers-some-incoming-students-alternate-options

 

[Chris in VA]

First airlines, now college?... <rollseyes>

I would be so mad if this happened to us. Overcrowded dorm, overcrowded classes...or go to CC, which, I'm sorry, is NOT the same "educational experience" as attending Uni. Perhaps the lower level courses are ok, but many students are not taking basic education/core studies. I was surprised to see several majors that start sequential courses in the major the very first year. And, many courses are not available at CC, nor are they offered in the summer at the Uni. 

VT screwed up. 

[Lanny]

Chris in VA.   I agree with you 100%    Actually, more than 100% if that is possible...   I am thankful my DD didn't apply to Virginia Tech. 

[Sebastian (a lady)]

This was the first year they used the Coalition Application instead of their in house app.  The school is increasingly popular with over 30k applications a year for the past couple years. 

In a similar way to how students apply to several colleges, not sure which will accept them, colleges have to forecast which accepted students will actually enroll.  This is their yield rate.  

I suspect that this type of thing will continue to happen. A couple years ago it was Purdue.  UVA also has issues; they are trying a program where students start at UVA Wise and then transfer to Charlottesville. 

Colleges want to have a predictable yield rate. If it's not predictable they tend to move to things like early decision (more predictable because of the terms of the application) or using waitlists and then pulling more kids off the waitlist late in April or in May.

Virginia Tech is a large school.  Given the number of acceptances is usually sends out a change in yield rate of a couple percentage points would mean 500 more students arriving.

Edited June 16, 2019 by Sebastian (a lady)

[Sebastian (a lady)]

BTW, the above comments aren't to say that I wouldn't be very frustrated by lack of dorms or other issues.  There are things Tech (and other schools) could do differently.  

But I don't see the uncertainty over yield going away in the near term.  It will contribute to more dependence on early decision, more acceptances, more use of waitlists, recruiting transfer students, encouraging early commitments through things like earlier housing deposits for housing priority, and also more misjudging the size of incoming classes (in both directions).

[MerryAtHope]

When I went to The University of Iowa in the 80’s, they routinely had overbooked dorms and set up the lounges as overflow housing. They also allowed Freshmen  to live off campus.  But I don’t think it was from over-enrollment.  I’d be very frustrated too!

Edited June 17, 2019 by MerryAtHope

[easypeasy]

I understand how this could happen, but I would be livid if I were an incoming freshman or his/her parent!

The uni dd1 attends had a similar issue her second year there. They were stacking freshmen 3 and 4 into dorm rooms intended for 2. So - 2 sets of bunkbeds for 4 ppl, only 2 desks and 2 closets and one bathroom. DD said it was miserable for the freshmen (who have to live in that specific dorm unless in the honors program).

The next year, they didn't admit a "record number of students" like they had bragged about the year before and set to work building a new dorm building, which was finished at the end of last year and is opening this fall.

What a mess!!!

[G5052]

That's horrible. So many students! That's a grave miscalculation. 

Both colleges I attended had issues with the dorms in the fall, but it was resolved fairly quickly after students left. So not too bad. One put beds into the study lounges and extra beds into the larger rooms, and one actually took over a wing at a local motel. I was the head RA at the one that used the motel, and we were able to get everyone into the dorms after a month. We ended up putting some older students into the graduate dorm even though they were undergraduates, which was actually a better situation for them.  

[klmama]

I remember students living in the lounges for a while, too, until rooms opened up.  Most moved within a month, but I had friends who didn't get a dorm room until November!  They didn't get a discount on their housing costs, either, which didn't seem fair.  If you paid for a triple, you should get a triple, not a room of 10!  

[JumpedIntoTheDeepEndFirst]

FWIW - Sweet Briar College (all women's college near VT) is offering guaranteed admission to their fully accredited engineering program to any one with an acceptance letter from VT. The overbooked Tech students have options.

[...................]

Yuck! I just flew across country twice this week and am always so frustrated by the last minute pleas to accept vouchers due to overbooking.  Of course, that is much better than bumping some poor soul...but still!

I guess if all of the students come anyway, they will have to pursue off campus dorm housing in hotels.  Didn't that just happen to CalPoly last year?  They ended up renting an entire wing of a hotel!

UC San Diego had a completely unexpected jump in applications this year. I wonder how their yield turned out....

 

[Chris in VA]

11 hours ago, JumpedIntoTheDeepEndFirst said:

FWIW - Sweet Briar College (all women's college near VT) is offering guaranteed admission to their fully accredited engineering program to any one with an acceptance letter from VT. The overbooked Tech students have options.

If I were an engineering student accepted to VT there's no way I'd go to Sweet Briar. The reputation difference alone would make me turn it down. Sweet Briar almost closed, too; while I don't know the current situation, I can understand why they made the offer.  Nothing against them--it's a lovely school w a good liberal arts rep, and some other majors, too, but just not in the same ballpark as Tech for engineering.  

[G5052]

4 hours ago, Chris in VA said:

If I were an engineering student accepted to VT there's no way I'd go to Sweet Briar. The reputation difference alone would make me turn it down. Sweet Briar almost closed, too; while I don't know the current situation, I can understand why they made the offer.  Nothing against them--it's a lovely school w a good liberal arts rep, and some other majors, too, but just not in the same ballpark as Tech for engineering.  

 

Yes, not at all comparable. VT is a nationally-ranked engineering school. 

Neither of mine are STEM majors, but in this situation I'd probably hold my ground. It's their problem, not mine.

On 6/16/2019 at 12:50 PM, Sebastian (a lady) said:

 There are things Tech (and other schools) could do differently.  

 

While, I too, would be livid if this impacted me or my family, I understand why it happens, and sympathize with the plight of the admissions staff.  My only surprise is that this doesn't happen more often.  Erring on accepting too many students results in huge problems for, say, 10% of the incoming class.  But, if the admissions folks erred in the other direction, and only half of the anticipated class size ended up enrolling, the lack of tuition could financially threaten the entire institution.

So, I'm curious what school could do differently.  As long as applicants are sending out lots of applications and can only enroll in one school, there is this potential.  One could imagine having  more rounds of ED at every school, but that seems to create other problems. 

[JumpedIntoTheDeepEndFirst]

7 hours ago, Chris in VA said:

If I were an engineering student accepted to VT there's no way I'd go to Sweet Briar. The reputation difference alone would make me turn it down. Sweet Briar almost closed, too; while I don't know the current situation, I can understand why they made the offer.  Nothing against them--it's a lovely school w a good liberal arts rep, and some other majors, too, but just not in the same ballpark as Tech for engineering.  

If my choices were between community college and automatic admission to an accredited engineering program I would not be taking community college classes. Yes, it is Tech's problem and they need to honor their commitment to the students they accepted. However, my point was there are options out there that would allow students to spend a year studying and transfer to Tech (which I understand is their plan for those who defer admission).

[Sebastian (a lady)]

3 hours ago, GGardner said:

 

While, I too, would be livid if this impacted me or my family, I understand why it happens, and sympathize with the plight of the admissions staff.  My only surprise is that this doesn't happen more often.  Erring on accepting too many students results in huge problems for, say, 10% of the incoming class.  But, if the admissions folks erred in the other direction, and only half of the anticipated class size ended up enrolling, the lack of tuition could financially threaten the entire institution.

So, I'm curious what school could do differently.  As long as applicants are sending out lots of applications and can only enroll in one school, there is this potential.  One could imagine having  more rounds of ED at every school, but that seems to create other problems. 

ED is definitely a route some colleges are taking. UVA just announced they will start ED.  I don't love this because it is mostly of benefit to the college at the students' expense. (And UVA's ED deadline is way too early in my opinion.)

 

Schools have to allow until May 1 for students to commit, but they could be sending out acceptance letters earlier.  Coupled with priority for housing based on date of deposit, this might give them more clarity on incoming class size and an ability to then pull people off the wait list.  

Basically I think they should send out fewer acceptances and use the waitlist more aggressively.  Too many colleges take few actual students off the waitlist. 

I also think on the whole there should be more openness about who is accepted and also who is turned down.  You can see middle 50% test scores of accepted students.  What you can't see is the percentage of students with similar stats who were turned down. (That might encourage students to be more realistic about applications.)  

They could make the application a little harder.  Adding a Why Us supplement might help with yield by letting them identify students who have made more of a conscious decision to apply.

Colleges could stop participating in rankings that are based on acceptance rate (which doesn't add meaning to how high quality the school is). This might eliminate the reward for soliciting quite so many applications in order to turn down a lot of students.

[Sebastian (a lady)]

3 hours ago, GGardner said:

 

While, I too, would be livid if this impacted me or my family, I understand why it happens, and sympathize with the plight of the admissions staff.  My only surprise is that this doesn't happen more often.  Erring on accepting too many students results in huge problems for, say, 10% of the incoming class.  But, if the admissions folks erred in the other direction, and only half of the anticipated class size ended up enrolling, the lack of tuition could financially threaten the entire institution.

So, I'm curious what school could do differently.  As long as applicants are sending out lots of applications and can only enroll in one school, there is this potential.  One could imagine having  more rounds of ED at every school, but that seems to create other problems. 

I checked the freshman snapshot over a few years. 

They accepted about 2000 more students than just a few classes ago. I think the overcrowding was not unpredictable. 

I have a student at Tech. His impression is that there is a goal to grow the university faster than it has capacity for.

There was a similar issue a couple years ago and again a couple years before that.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.roanoke.com/news/education/virginia-tech-preps-for-largest-freshman-class-in-school-history/article_4a09f6a1-f966-5b4d-ad6a-42c0f3eb1e0b.amp.html

[Sebastian (a lady)]

Case in point on waitlists.  According to the most recent VT Common Data Set, they offered over 3000 students a spot on their waitlist and 2400 indicated they were interested in being on the waitlist. 

How many did they report taking off the waitlist? 0

Eta: if you go back several years the taken off waitlist box is empty, but in recent years they are reporting 0 students iffered admission from the list.  So yeah, I think overcrowding is avoidable. 

Edited June 18, 2019 by Sebastian (a lady)

[Guest]

4 hours ago, JumpedIntoTheDeepEndFirst said:

If my choices were between community college and automatic admission to an accredited engineering program I would not be taking community college classes. Yes, it is Tech's problem and they need to honor their commitment to the students they accepted. However, my point was there are options out there that would allow students to spend a year studying and transfer to Tech (which I understand is their plan for those who defer admission).

At 3x the tuition of VA tech for a VA resident, who are the only kids being asked to wait. I don’t think that taking a year at 3x the amount of tuition  is going to be a good choice for most kids. And Sweet Briar, while a beautiful campus, has an acceptance rate currently that pretty much is the same as a community college. 

[Lanny]

DD applied to 4 Public universities. I don't think any of them had ED. She applied EA to UNC and that's where she is going to be.   With regard to getting cleared off the Waitlists...  When I was looking at that on CollegeData, for several different universities, only a very tiny percentage of those on the waiting lists were cleared from the waiting lists.  IMO it happens, but it is very rare.

With regard to what Sebastian wrote about her student at VT thinking they want to "grow" the university, ASAP, I understand that, and that's common, but they seem to be doing it in a disorganized way and that IMO is irresponsible.  I'm trying to put myself in the shoes of the VT Admissions Dept. and the history they have of past years to go by and the information they had available didn't seem to fit this year.

Edited June 18, 2019 by Lanny
correct typo

[lewelma]

My sister is an engineering professor at a VA community college. She has worked hard for many years to make her classes compatible/comparable with UVA and thus transferable. So the CC route for the students choosing to defer could give an equally good education depending on which CC you go to.

My nephew has just finished his freshman year at VT, and he had a hell of a time getting classes last year.  My sister and he spent days and days trying to come up with plans A, B, and C depending on what classes filled up and if he got the lottery to get in or not.  With some courses having prereqs he wasn't sure he could get into, and then some classes meeting at the same time, one lost class meant his entire schedule would have to change. And if he delayed registering for a class, hoping to get into another one and then didn't get in, it might be too late to get into the second choice as it was already full.  It was quite a thing.

I say use the wait list.  Why not? Isn't this exact problem that it is designed to avoid?

Edited June 19, 2019 by lewelma

[Lanny]

lewelma This is for your Nephew at VT.  Possibly it will help him get the classes he needs and help him juggle his class schedule. Someone on WTM mentioned Couriscle in a thread, months ago, and I made a mental note of it, for my DD to possibly use.  https://www.coursicle.com/

[Reefgazer]

On ‎6‎/‎18‎/‎2019 at 9:49 AM, JumpedIntoTheDeepEndFirst said:

If my choices were between community college and automatic admission to an accredited engineering program I would not be taking community college classes. Yes, it is Tech's problem and they need to honor their commitment to the students they accepted. However, my point was there are options out there that would allow students to spend a year studying and transfer to Tech (which I understand is their plan for those who defer admission).

FWIW, VT has a full articulation agreement with Virginia Community Colleges, and community college students are guaranteed admission to Tech with 3.0 average.  So taking frosh courses at a community college in Virginia is equivalent to VT frosh classes (according to Tech).  https://www.tcc.edu/uploads/pdf/articulation/gaa-eng-vt-vccs.pdf

Edited June 24, 2019 by Reefgazer

[Miguelsmom]

I would have my son take the gap year option. Then he could study at his leisure, explore interests, get a job and relax after all the hard work to get into VT.

[JumpedIntoTheDeepEndFirst]

8 hours ago, Reefgazer said:

FWIW, VT has a full articulation agreement with Virginia Community Colleges, and community college students are guaranteed admission to Tech with 3.0 average.  So taking frosh courses at a community college in Virginia is equivalent to VT frosh classes (according to Tech).  https://www.tcc.edu/uploads/pdf/articulation/gaa-eng-vt-vccs.pdf

 

On 6/18/2019 at 2:33 AM, Chris in VA said:

If I were an engineering student accepted to VT there's no way I'd go to Sweet Briar. The reputation difference alone would make me turn it down. Sweet Briar almost closed, too; while I don't know the current situation, I can understand why they made the offer.  Nothing against them--it's a lovely school w a good liberal arts rep, and some other majors, too, but just not in the same ballpark as Tech for engineering.  

 

8 hours ago, Reefgazer said:

FWIW, VT has a full articulation agreement with Virginia Community Colleges, and community college students are guaranteed admission to Tech with 3.0 average.  So taking frosh courses at a community college in Virginia is equivalent to VT frosh classes (according to Tech).  https://www.tcc.edu/uploads/pdf/articulation/gaa-eng-vt-vccs.pdf

 

The point of my post was to say that there were colleges in Virginia that were giving easy opportunities for students who had been accepted to Tech to get courses under their belts and attend college while they waited to be able to be physically present in Blacksburg, if they were not permitted to enroll next fall (forced to defer). My intent was not to get myself (or Sweet Briar) beaten up for offering alternatives to what is a ridiculous situation created by Tech themselves. I'm well versed in the costs and opportunities at VA colleges, since I'm busy paying tuition to two of them right now.