While the program has accepted 90 sophomores every year since 1995, the number of applicants has varied slightly. Last year, 180 students applied compared to the 162 who applied in 2010.
2007 was the most selective application class in the last five years, with 190 applicants, for a 47 percent admittance rate. On average, 165 students have applied to the program over the past 10 years.
The application consisted of a 300-word personal statement, a list of extracurricular activities and foreign language capabilities and a letter of recommendation from a University faculty member. Students also indicated on the application their planned courses for the next four semesters and proposed a concentration on a specific policy issue they wished to study. They also indicated whether they wished to apply for a concentration or a certificate.
A faculty committee considers all applications, looking at the applicants’ interests in public affairs, academic records and their capacity to benefit from the program, according to the program website.
As a committee member, Wilson School professor Stanley Katz read one-third of the applications and said he did not know how representative his sample of applications was of the pool as a whole. However, he said his “casual impression” was that the quality of applicants this year was similar to those of years past.
Katz said that he noticed more interest in education issues in the applications he read than in years past.
“It seemed to me that K-12 education was the most frequently mentioned policy interest of applicants,” Katz said, attributing some interest to the growth of Students for Education Reform, a campus organization.
SFER president Elizabeth LaMontagne ’14 said she thinks the organization’s programming has helped increase interest in K-12 policy reform.
“This semester, we have about 50 students enrolled in our discussion series that meets once a week, where we discuss education policy issues, such as school vouchers or teacher evaluation in groups of eight to 10 students,” LaMontagne said in an email.
Katz said that there is currently a waitlist of five or six students.
Over the past year, the Wilson School has undergone a number of structural changes. Last April, the Wilson School voted to end its selective admission process beginning with the Class of 2015. This past February, the Wilson School announced a series of changes to its curriculum.
As a result of the shift to open admissions, Katz predicted that 200 to 250 students would join the Wilson School next year.
“It will be interesting to see how well we can handle so many students,” Katz said.
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