Harvard University announced its Class of 2027 and, hopefully to the surprise of no one, its acceptance rate remained very low. The prestigious Ivy League school accepted 1,942 applicants between its early action and regular decision rounds from 56,937 applications.
Applications dropped a bit for Harvard’s Class of 2027
The 3.4% acceptance rate is a bit above last year’s 3.2% acceptance rate and applications did drop from last year’s high-water mark of 61,220. Harvard has been aggressively marketing its generous financial aid policies so we don’t think affordability or general economic conditions are responsible for the application drop. Additionally, we don’t believe there was any substantial “fall out” from the alleged admissions collusion case.
We will briefly address the “elephant in the room” and cite some applicant vocalizations, some vaguer than others, that the school’s political stance may be deterring some prospective applicants. This is, however, next to impossible to measure as many applicants and parents have no interest in speaking about this on the record. We simply know what we hear from parents. We also believe that not even the Harvard admissions office would have accurate information on this as a substantial number of applicants will try to appear to be what they believe Harvard is seeking and would tone down political views that don’t fit with their perceived leanings of the venerable school.
In conclusion, however, let’s be clear that a 3.4% acceptance rate for an applicant pool that only the strongest students even consider entering is still quite an accomplishment. Accordingly, we want to congratulate all of the 1,942 admitted applicants on their tremendous accomplishment!
