Boston College received almost 30,000 applications for the undergraduate Class of 2024, Grant Gosselin, director of Undergraduate Admissions, told The Heights in an email.
BC received more than 5,000 fewer applications for the Class of 2024 than it did for the Class of 2023.
This is the first round of applications since BC changed from Early Action (EA) admissions to an Early Decision (ED) policy with two rounds, in addition to a Regular Decision (RD) round. Gosselin said that the numbers met the University’s expectations of a decline in early applications and an increase in Regular Decision applicants.
ED applications numbered at around 2,750, Gosselin said, and Regular Decision applications came in at roughly 26,600—37 percent more than the applications for the Class of 2023.
When BC announced that it would be switching from EA to ED, there was potential for the change to make the applicant pool less diverse—Harvard and Princeton dropped their ED options in 2006, concerned that they limit minority and low-income applications—but the preliminary applications report indicates that this has not been the case.
The statistical profile of the Class of 2024 is still in progress, though AHANA applications make up a larger portion of the pool than last year, Gosselin said in a University release. AHANA+ applications made up 36.5 percent of the applicant pool, as compared to 33.7 percent last year.
BC announced in January that it would be partnering with QuestBridge, a nonprofit that helps low-income students apply to top-tier universities, for its admissions process beginning with the Class of 2024. QuestBridge only partners with schools that have ED admissions, and Gosselin told The Heights in an earlier interview that this played a minor role in the switch.
ED I applicants received their admissions decisions from the University on Dec. 15, and ED II applicants are scheduled to receive their decisions by Feb. 15. RD applicants will receive their admissions decisions by April 1.
Featured Image by Ikram Ali / Heights Editor
