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The gap between the number of men vs women on college campuses is the highest its been in modern times. According to a new USA Today article, this fall, 60% of college students on campus will identify as women, and 40% as men. Just fifty years ago, this figure was reversed, 60% men vs. 40% women. And even more alarming for those colleges seeking a gender balance, is that if you look at the enrollment loss of students over the last five years (where fewer people have been going to college at all), the share of men lost is even higher at 71%. This gap, which has been growing for some time has not been formally attributed to any one phenomenon via research. But it presents an opportunity for men, especially at certain highly selective colleges, to fill a need and gain an edge in the college admissions process.
Men are being accepted into most highly selective colleges at a higher rate than women
At Vassar College, for example, where the student population is just 38% male, the acceptance rate for men is a full five percentage points higher: 23% of women were accepted and 28% of men were accepted in 2020. Similar stats present themselves at high-end schools like Swarthmore (8% acceptance rate for women vs. 11% for men), and Boston College (24% of women vs. 29% for men). Men who are seeking admission to schools in this selectivity range should consider adding colleges that are interested in admitting them.
So what can women do to shift the admissions process in their favor? They can apply to colleges that traditionally attract more men. At Caltech, for example, everybody has a hard time gaining admission, but women get in at more than twice the rate of men (5% of men are accepted vs. 11% of women). Other highly selective schools that skew male include MIT (5% of men vs. 12% of women) and Carnegie Mellon University (11% of men are accepted vs. 23% of women). Women should also think about the many high-quality women’s only colleges, a group that has experienced an increase in applications since 2016. Interest in these colleges has gone up, but relative to other highly-ranked colleges, they still receive fewer applications per seat than those co-ed colleges who have similar ranks in US News and Report. For example, Amherst receives 25 applications from women for each seat it has in its class. At Wellesley, ranked just a few spots below, it receives just 11 applications for each seat in its class.
Gender balance may mean only a few percentage points in the application process, but if you are seeking a highly selective college, these are odds worth considering.
