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Index Calculator | Ivy
League Admissions
Although the Ivy League schools spent many years denying
they used any kind of formula, they in fact have been using
a ranking formula since the 1950’s called the Academic
Index, AI for short. Though it has traditionally been used
for sports purposes (maintaining some kind of academic standard
on the various athletic teams), every Ivy League school still
calculates an AI for every student. Why? Because the average
AI of the athletic teams cannot be more than one standard
deviation away from the average AI of the entire class, but
the only way to know that is to calculate an AI for every
student. Naturally since the number was so easy to generate,
many schools began to print the number right on the front
of every student’s folder and used it to help them rank
a student academically. Please understand that the AI is just
a statistical tool – it does not take into account a
student’s essays, teacher recommendations, outside achievements
or awards. It merely chronicles the objective side of the
equation, namely high school rank in class and standardized
test scores. In short, the AI is a formula that combines the
averages of student test scores (both SAT I’s and SAT
II’s) and high school rank in class (represented by
an Ivy League invention, the converted rank score or CRS).
The AI is represented on a scale of 1-240, with 240 being
the highest. The approximate average of Ivy applicants is
around 200 while the average AI of accepted students is closer
to the 211 range.
Every school has a different method of computing rank so
figuring out your own CRS may be hard. The most accurate way
(and the preferred method) is to have an exact weighted rank.
If your school provides rank, use the first part of the CRS
input field. Next the formula turns to decile rankings (top
10%, top 20%), but be aware that the formula only approximates
the MIDPOINT of the range, so anyone who enters only “top
10%” effectively gets counted as exactly 5% in the class
hierarchy. Finally, if neither rank nor decile is available,
the formula will take into account a GPA, but often that inflates
the CRS and the ranking appears higher.
Obviously admissions offices that use the AI use it along
with all the subjective information and make informed decisions
about how to understand the most complex part of the formula,
the CRS. Why then does the AI matter? Most importantly, it
will help you gage your chances for admission since there
is a very high correlation between high AI’s and high
acceptance rates.
On
to the calculator!
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