Undergraduate Admissions

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Stanford's undergraduates are among the most talented and capable students in the country. This has long been the case. Given the relative youth of the institution, the impact of our alumni over the past century in government, business, science, and the arts has been substantial.

By most standards, our ability to attract the best undergraduates is remarkable. Roughly ten students vie for every opening. Our weakest candidates, judging by test scores and grade point averages, are still among the strongest high school students in the nation. We are among the very small handful of institutions that attracts such a strong applicant pool and can afford to be extremely selective from within that pool.

For Fall l997, we had 16,842 applicants. We admitted 15 percent, or 2,596. Of those who were admitted, 63 percent, or 1,640, chose to enroll.

In the early 1990s, there were some disturbing trends developing that deserved our full attention. The yield rate--that is, the percentage of students who accepted our offer of admission--had declined from 63 percent in 1986 to a low of 54 percent in 1994. We were losing more students to East Coast competitors and we were attracting somewhat fewer students who were ranked in the top academic categories by our Admissions Office. Several theories were offered to explain this trend. Some argued that the Loma Prieta earthquake in 1989 caused families to worry about the safety of the Bay Area. Others observed that negative publicity in the early 1990s had damaged Stanford's reputation. It is likely that both of these were factors in the decline in our yield rate, though it is also the case that some ups and downs in the popularity of colleges seem to be, if not random events, then the results of fads that are hard to pin down.

In 1992, when I came to Stanford, I found a relative lack of focus in the way we were presenting Stanford to potential applicants. Among the first things I did after my arrival was to review the literature we sent out. Our own admissions brochures seemed to pay as much attention to extracurricular opportunities as they did to our rigorous academic programs.

I am wont to say that there are eight reasons why a student should choose Stanford:

• First, because Stanford is one of the best universities in the world, and therefore those who seek out the wide range of opportunities that Stanford offers will be rewarded in ways that are not easily matched anywhere;

• Second, there continues at Stanford what one might call a "Western" spirit of pioneering, entrepreneurship, and energy;

• Third, because of the diversity Stanford contains: academic achievements, artistic and athletic accomplishments, ethnic and social backgrounds;

• Fourth, because of the opportunities Stanford affords for service to the public;

• Fifth, because Stanford believes in the Roman adage "a sound mind in a sound body," and the pursuit of excellences at Stanford includes athletics;

• Sixth, because Stanford, literally located on the Pacific Rim, has a global reach and international focus, as expressed by its faculty and students;

• Seventh, because of Stanford's unsurpassed setting: the gentle climate, the foothills, the bay, the yellow sandstone arches and cloisters, the "red tile roofs against the azure sky";

• And finally, because of the singular, almost magical, combination of these attributes and the effects it produces.

Thus, Stanford cannot and should not be reduced to a single defining characteristic. However, when all is told, the academic challenges offered and the quality of faculty and students are the raison d'être of our institutional existence.

Under the leadership of Dean of Admission James Montoya--now vice provost for student affairs--we introduced several new approaches to help turn around the decline in yield rates. Publications were revamped and primary emphasis was put on the academic strengths of Stanford. We introduced an early decision program in 1996, paralleling programs at some of our leading competitors and enabling very strong candidates to secure a place at Stanford well before the normal admissions season.

Early decision is an application option for students who know early in their senior year that Stanford is their first choice and feel ready to be evaluated on their academic and extracurricular record as it stands at that point and who are ready to make a binding commitment to attend if admitted. Stanford had not offered any form of early admission before, and we concluded that this had placed us at a disadvantage vis-à-vis competitors that did. We have, nevertheless, been fairly restrained in our embrace of early decision. For Fall 1997, 23 percent (608 out of a total of 2,596 admits) were early decision admits.

Finally, beginning in 1993, by means of strengthening an existing program, we singled out about two hundred applicants for admission with special recognition as President's Scholars. This designation now includes a guarantee of research funding in the amount of $1,500 through the Office of Undergraduate Research Opportunities. For Fall 1997, 48 percent of the President's Scholar candidates accepted our offer--up from 29 percent only three years earlier.

This and other initiatives are part of a yield enhancement program that Jim Montoya announced in the spring of 1995. Overall, our acceptance rate, the yield, has climbed from 54 percent in 1994 to 55 percent to 61 percent to 63 percent. The yield among those applicants whom our admissions office considers the academically strongest is the highest since we began to keep relevant records. It is, of course, my hope that serendipity is not the only factor at work here, and that our various initiatives, especially the academic ones, are persuading applicants that we are indeed dedicated to the pursuit of many excellences in undergraduate education and that conditions for that pursuit are excellent across a wide range of disciplines.

None of this has changed our need-blind admissions policy. It is gratifying that Stanford has been able to maintain its commitment to providing a comprehensive financial aid program for admitted students who meet requisite conditions. Stanford's undergraduate financial aid program is need-based. If there is financial need--that is, a difference between the student's resources and the cost of attending the university--Stanford will offer aid, including loans, job eligibility, and grants or scholarships, to meet that need. About 60 percent of undergraduates receive financial aid in one form or another, 80 percent of which comes from Stanford resources.

I fear, of course, for middle-class and even "upper"-middle-class families who do not make enough to pay the full bill but make too much to qualify for sufficient financial aid (in view of their overall family resources). In response to that, Stanford has restrained tuition increases. We must keep in mind, however, that even undergraduates who pay full tuition still contribute only about 60 percent of the cost of providing their own education. The rest comes from endowment and annual giving. While Stanford is well positioned to rise to the challenge, our financial resources are still surpassed--in some cases by a large margin--by those of institutions with which we must compete for the best faculty and students.

Princeton's larger endowment supports an undergraduate student body of only about 4,600, compared to Stanford's 6,500. That is one reason that Princeton covers an amazing 94 percent of its undergraduate financial aid with endowment income. Harvard's endowment allows it to fund more than half its undergraduate aid. Stanford, meanwhile, stands at 39 percent.

Herein lies the main reason I have developed The Stanford Fund and why I am placing such priority on unrestricted annual giving, which at Stanford was, and continues to be, relatively weak. We must find anew every year almost two-thirds of the financial aid that Stanford itself provides, and The Stanford Fund plays a critical role in filling that gap. While The Stanford Fund is meant to support all aspects of undergraduate education, I have dedicated 60 percent of its annual revenue to undergraduate financial aid. Comparing annual giving to payout from endowment, $5 million in annual small and large gifts to The Stanford Fund, for instance, is the rough equivalent of the payout we receive from about $100 million worth of endowment. Put differently, we would have to raise $100 million of endowment to match $5 million in Stanford Fund revenues.