UT-Austin Fall 2020 First-Time Freshman Client Outcomes and Admissions Statistics
Mom and I in Vanua Levu, Fiji
Each year, I publish my client outcomes and overall UT admissions statistics. Although UT admitted for Fall 2020 a record low 28% of their applicants, 30 out of 48 clients (63%) gained admission to their first choice UT-Austin major.
I had my first client win the Forty Acres Scholarship Program among four highly qualified students who attempted applications this year. Four gained admission to Canfield Business Honors, four to Plan II, and one each to Engineering and Liberal Arts Honors and Turing. A second client will be attending UT Honors on a full-ride between renewable merit scholarships and need-based aid. Another received a local chapter Texas Exes scholarship.
Check out my new book Surviving the College Admissions Madness and Youtube Channel
I assist around a third of my clients with their applications nationwide. They gained admission to every University of California campus multiple times including Regents Scholarships for Berkeley EECS and Irvine. Five gained admission to UCLA and four to UC-Berkeley. One client got into MIT, Columbia, and Duke. Three gained admission to Michigan and Rice. Two each were admitted to USC, Tulane, Vanderbilt, and Georgia Tech. Other notable offers include Emory, Johns Hopkins, Northeastern, Notre Dame, and NYU.
I’ve converted this data into rule-of-thumb minimum rank and test score recommendations that I’ve updated since Fall 2020 to consider yourself competitive to UT majors. For Fall 2021, I’m employing a strict cutoff of top 15% with a 1400/31 for taking on clients and higher for selective majors/OOS applicants because very view outside of those academics will be competitive for most UT programs.
My recommendations will not change because of UT-Austin going test-optional, which I discuss here. If you choose not to submit an ACT/SAT, you still need to have most or all A’s on the honors/AP track to be competitive, especially for majors that are in high demand.
In this post I share:
About the creative feedback and editing process of my client services
Summary of my clients’ UT admissions outcomes
Detailed data about their academic profiles and outcomes by college/school
Master list of all university and scholarship offers
Something new this year by lifting the hood on some Tex Admissions analytics
Pick up your copy of my college admissions book Your Ticket to the Forty Acres
Tex Admissions Client Services Process
My clients worked very hard this past cycle. Typically, we process three to five rounds of essay and resume revisions before submitting. On average, we spend six weeks on Apply Texas and the UT application. For my 17 clients where we collaborated on applications in addition to Apply Texas, their writing improved substantially with each subsequent draft. Since Fall 2016, 128 out of 208 first-time clients have have gained admission (62%).
“I am extremely grateful to you for all the help you provided very promptly to our daughter for all her essays as well as any other questions she bombarded you with. We loved your method of interaction and use of Google Docs comments to communicate back and forth. It was a very productive way of reviewing and commenting on the essays. We really never felt the need of phone calls or video chats much. Your email replies have always been so elaborate, honest, and satisfactory.”
Video Calls
One major change in my services this year involved video/phone calls for each client. I only offered this as an on-request service in previous cycles. For Fall 2020 first-time freshman, we connected usually for an hour and upwards of two for some students.
I observed at the end of the Fall 2020 cycle that I needed to have the option for a second call for this upcoming cycle. Although additional phone calls weren’t always necessary, I’m responding to my client feedback by offering them this year to all first-time freshman clients. I will also clearly communicate expectations following the call to begin promptly the essay drafting process.
Getting to know students over the phone was honestly a ton of fun and a highlight of my professional life. It helped us develop rapport and trust early on, establish expectations, and brainstorm the essays. I’m constantly floored at how impressive American teenagers are. It gives me optimism for the future.
Video calls also helped mine for essay nuggets. I can’t tell you the number of times, towards the end of a call, the student or a parent would say “I don’t think this would be a very good topic, but I do…” and proceed to tell me the most interesting thing from the chat. One of my favorites turned into an essay on baking goodies for friends and family and spinning it into a small business and charity for their Essay A Tell Us Your Story.
Moreso than the writing and application building itself, almost all of my clients felt our relationship helped lessen stress and alleviate anxiety:
“I never in my wildest dreams imagined that my daughter would get acceptances from UT, McCombs and Plan II!! I cannot thank you enough for encouraging Abby to fully express herself and for your wisdom and care in reviewing and polishing her work. I would not have been comfortable encouraging her to push the envelope like she did, and that expression of her creativity clearly made all the difference in her tremendous achievement! Abby’s life is on an amazing trajectory with limitless possibilities ahead of her. I can’t express how important your passion and guidance were to making her UT dreams a reality.”
86 first-time freshman and transfer clients since Fall 2017 have submitted my end-of-year questionnaire soliciting feedback with 1 as strongly disagree and 5 as strongly agree with the following statements.
My clients answered 4.85/5 in strong agreement with the statement: Do you feel that you submitted your strongest application?
How satisfied are you overall with our work? They rated our work 4.75/5
4.75/5 feel satisfied with counseling services - communication, guidance, expertise
They responded with agree 4s and strongly agree 5s, 250 times out of 258 possible answers
Fall 2020 freshman clients answered strongly agree 80% of the time and 20% agree. All who responded would recommend me to their friends and family. Nobody responded with a 3 or lower to any question.
Check out my new book Surviving the College Admissions Madness and Youtube Channel
Client Results Summary
30 of 48 my Fall 2020 first-time freshman clients gained admission including 16 out of 28 non-automatically Texas residents (57% compared with a projected 10% admissions rate for non-top 6% applicants). Five gained admission on appeal to their first-choice major. My client admissions rate before appeals was 52%.
2 out of 7 out-of-state (29% compared with the projected 8% university OOS admit average average).
My typical client comes from the top 10% of their class scoring around a 32.4 or 1460 on the ACT/SAT. My average client this year was slightly higher academically than from 2019. By contrast, I estimate that the average admitted UT student comes from the top 7% of their class scoring around a 31 or 1360 on the ACT/SAT.
My clients tend to have above average resumes with a few exceptions in both directions. Many aim for honors or selective majors like Business, Engineering, or Computer Science. Almost all of them completed their application by the November 1 priority deadline. Many gain admission to selective and prestigious programs nationwide.
You can view the academic breakdowns for popular majors like Computer Science, The Cockrell School of Engineering, and the McCombs School of Business in the linked posts.
Those not getting into UT almost always have a UTD Scholarship with Honors and Texas A&M Honors as second and third chances. Others attend SMU, TCU, Baylor, and non-Texas universities on scholarships and honors programs.
Some clients were denied/CAP’d received generous offers from arguably more selective universities or programs than UT like: Johns Hopkins, Illinois, Michigan, Tulane, UNC-Chapel Hill, UC-Santa Barbara, UC-San Diego, and Vanderbilt.
Other clients who UT did not admit received various honors and scholarship offers from: Arkansas, Baylor, Clemson, Colorado School of Mines, Embry Riddle, Hardon Simmons, Houston, Indiana, NC State, Oklahoma, Oregon, UNC-Charlotte, Texas A&M CS/Business/Engineering, South Carolina, St. Edwards, Tulane, SMU, Texas Lutheran, Texas State, Texas Tech, UTD CS/Business/Engineering, UC-Boulder, UTSA
I provide a comprehensive list of all of the universities and scholarships my clients earned for Fall 2020 at the bottom of this post. Overall, I am pleased with their results, and I feel our work makes a positive difference in their chances. I provide a shorter summary first followed by specific data.
Here is a scatterplot showing admitted and denied students regardless of program - all scores are converted into SAT. As you can see, great rank and test scores are no guarantees of admission, and sometimes students with slightly lower credentials find success depending on their first choice major.
N = 48
(View the Freshman Fall 2019 client outcomes here and Fall 2018 here)
Fall 2020 UT-Austin Applicant Data
First, I present the demographic and academic information of my clients. Second, I discuss their outcomes. Later, I will analyze this data and discuss potential implications.
Where do my clients come from and what are their academics?
Automatically admitted Texas Residents (Top 6%): 13
Non-automatically admitted Texas Residents: 28
Non-Texas OOS/Foreign: 7
Average Class Rank of all clients, including estimating for non-ranking schools: Top 10%
Client Academic Index Range based on my formulas: 2.75 to 3.97
Client Academic Index Average: 3.58
Academic Index Admit Average: 3.72
Academic Index Deny/CAP Average: 3.45
Client Average ACT: 33.8
ACT Range: 31 - 36
Admit Average ACT: 34.3
Deny/CAP Average ACT: 33.25
Client Average SAT: 1458
SAT Range: 1270 - 1590
Admit Average SAT: 1491
Deny/CAP Average SAT: 1351
For whatever reason, my clients had much higher average ACT than SAT scores this year yet the ACT scores did, on average and isolating for class rank, a little less well than SAT takers. This is a very small sample size so it isn’t possible to draw strong conclusions.
The biggest surprise was three Liberal Arts Texas residents applicants each in the 7-9% range with around a 1450 who all got denied, although two subsequently gained admission on appeal. I suggest staying away from COLA in the future since many of those spaces are filled by top 6% - the only program guaranteed admission besides maybe some majors in Moody Communications.
Overall, there were 8 students I felt confident would get in, who didn’t (including 2 OOS computer science applicants), and 3 I wasn’t confident would gain admission and who did (including a McCombs and an Engineering). The biggest surprise was a top 5% with a 36 Texas resident denied to Computer Science.
I estimate that my average client receives a 4.75 out of 6 on their Personal Achievement Index score review based the holistic review process (less than 1% of all applicants receive a 6). I estimate that 6 clients earned the highest review score of 6.
The Academic Index is how UT calculate a student's class rank and test scores. This single number accounts for 50% of a student's admissions review. The highest AI score is a 4, and the typical UT applicant has around a 3. UT has not updated this formula since 2014, so I’ve created my own called the Adjusted Academic Index. I will modify and update these formulas with new information I’ve learned for Fall 2020 and onward.
Check out my new book Surviving the College Admissions Madness and Youtube Channel
“Kevin did everything he said he would do and more. He always responded promptly while working on the essays or just in answering general questions, and we had a lot of them. His approach and strategy to writing the essays and assembling a resume is spot on and really helped my son focus in on what would work best for him. I can’t imagine a better service at an extremely reasonable price and I highly recommend Kevin to anyone considering using him. ”
Pick up your copy of my college admissions book Your Ticket to the Forty Acres
Client UT-Austin Admissions Outcomes
30/48 Clients gained admission (63%)
16/28 non-top 6% Texas Residents gained admission (54% compared with 10% of students outside of the top 6%)
2/7 OOS applicants gained admission (57% compared with 8% non-Texas admit rate)
Profile of the typical admitted client: Top 6.5% scoring a 34.3 or a 1480 on the ACT/SAT
Profile of the typical denied/CAP/PACE client: Top 14.5% scoring a 33.25 or a 1351 on the ACT/SAT
In almost all cases, UT only considers a student's first choice major. UT compares applicants against those seeking their first choice.
First-choice majors admits/applicants
14/17 Business including 4 Canfield Business Honors admits from 6 Interviews, three admitted to regular McCombs on appeals
6/13 Computer Science including 1 OOS Turing Scholar
3/7 Engineering including 1 Engineering Honors Program (EHP)
5/7 Liberal Arts including 4 Plan II Honors and 1 Liberal Arts Honors admits
1/3 Natural Sciences
1/1 Education
0/1 Undergraduate Studies
List of all UT-Austin offers: Forty Acres Finalist, Terry Program Scholarship Semifinalist, Presidential Scholarship, Liberal Arts Honors, Plan II Honors, Canfield Business Honors, Engineering Honors, Mechanical and Petroleum Engineering, Computer Science, Sports Management, Psychology, Economics, Government, Astronomy
Interested in working together? Complete my questionnaire for a free consultation
Complete list of all admitted universities
Universities that offered Honors and/or Scholarships (half tuition or greater in bold), client offer number in parenthesis
Arizona (2 Full Rides); Arkansas; Chapman; Clemson; Colorado-Boulder; Duke; Emory; Embry Riddle (3); Fordham (Full Ride); Georgia; Georgia Tech (2); Illinois (4 CS, 1 Geis Business); Indiana (4 Kelley Business w/ Scholarships); Johns Hopkins, Maryland; Michigan (3 Haas); School of Mines (3); Minnesota; MIT; NC State; Northeastern; Notre Dame; NYU; Ohio State; Oregon; Oklahoma; Pittsburgh; Purdue (2); South Carolina; Tulane (2); UNC Charlotte; UNC Chapel Hill; USC (2 Presidential Scholarships); Wisconsin (2)
University of California System
Berkeley (3) with Haas, EECS and Regents; Davis (2); Irvine with Regents; Merced; Los Angeles (4); Riverside; San Diego (3); Santa Barbara (3) and California State Polytechnic (2)
Texas Universities
Texas A&M Mays Business (5) and Engineering (14) with 5 Honors Offers; UT-Dallas Jindal Business (6) and Engineering (11) with 3 Honors Offers and 6 Full Tuition Scholarships
Baylor (4 Scholarship/Honors Offers); Hardon Simmons; University of Houston; Rice (2); SMU (9 Scholarship/Honors Offers with 1 full ride); St Edwards; TCU (4 Deans Scholarship Offers); Texas Lutheran; Texas State; Texas Tech; Trinity College; UTSA
(View the complete list of admitted universities since Fall 2016 at the bottom of my services page)
How do my clients find me? How many people visit www.TexAdmissions.com?
On my first-time freshman questionnaire, I ask students and families how they found me. Sometimes, they ask me how my clients typically find me. My McCombs clients also ask questions about my search traffic and analytics. I thought it would be fun to include this data.
N = 231. Professional referrals come from other colleagues or marketplaces like Overgrad; client referrals are usually word-of-mouth
I filmed my first Youtube videos in Maastrich, the Netherlands with my close friend Jan. We uploaded four short videos unedited, and I received my first client for whom Youtube was their first contact a month later.
Thanks Charlie Saginaw for the Youtube idea! It would have never occurred to me otherwise. My channel has since received over 2,500 subscribers and 300,000 views. Not viral or prolific by any stretch, but for a niche, low-budget approach, I pride myself in providing high-quality content for anyone around the world to teach themselves about UT and college admissions.
I’ve since uploaded over 70 videos, and if not for Youtube, it’s possible Tex Admissions would have never gotten off the ground. Transfers in particular find me through Youtube since there are comparatively much fewer transfer resources and content than for first-time freshman.
Tex Admissions Analytics 2019
My traffic nearly doubled from 2018 to 2019, which had increased 500% from 2017 to 2018. January 2020 is up double from January 2019. I anticipate my 2020 traffic will flatten or increase slightly from 2019. I pay for zero advertisement, and most of my traffic comes through organic search. I rank in the top ten in almost all relevant Google search terms. I never took a business class in college or read much about advertising or SEO in general.
I believe firmly in providing the highest quality content possible with no redirects, clickbait, or nonsense. There seem to be many “explosive growth” gimmicks and “analytic coaches” who promise viral traffic. I’ve not had a single viral blog post or video, yet Tex Admissions performs well. There is no substitute for supplying content that adds value. Gradual growth pays long-term dividends. You can’t hack authenticity and expertise.