Only 3.74% applicants get into Columbia, what makes them stand out?

In this blog, we will discuss admission metrics from the official Columbia Common Data Set, and look into the detailed profiles of Columbia admits. Finally we will share sample extracurriculars and essays of recently admitted students.

Let's first crunch the numbers and figure the archetype behind a Columbia Admit.

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Insight #1: 95.7% of admitted students ranked within the top 10% of their high school class.

Insight #2: The Columbia Common Dataset does not include information on the average GPA of students. However, estimates suggest that the average GPA might be around 3.9.

Even though the Columbia Common Dataset doesn't reveal the average GPA of admitted students, we can estimate it by considering the high school rank and average GPA of other schools with similar academic profiles. This estimation suggests that Columbia's average GPA might be around 3.9.

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Insight #3: Around 43% students submitted their SAT score without the exam being required.

Even though SAT/ACT are not required. Scores are considered in the decision to roll out an admit. 

Columbia Common Data Set reveals that:

43% of admitted students submitted a SAT score, and 24% students submitted an ACT score.

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Insight #4: Your high school subject choices trump high standardized scores 

What factors did Columbia report as the main key things they look at in the admissions committee?
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Insight #5: Columbia suggests 4 recommended units for many key subjects

These are Carnegie units (one unit equals one year of study or its equivalent)

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Insight #6: The number of extracurriculars of majority of admitted students ranged from 6-9

This observation is based on analyzing the profiles of admitted Columbia students.An open resource repository of admits gradgpt.com/tools/admits-like-me allows you to explore admitted student profiles and potentially build your own application strategy around these insights.

Let's look at the student below who was admitted to the Columbia CS program. 

The student was involved in over 9 extracurricular activities, such as robotics, participation in campus clubs, MIT Battlecode AI competition, hackathon, physics simulations. Additionally, they wrote their Common App essay about their shortcomings in MUN.

By analyzing the Columbia common data set, we can glean insights into standardized test scores, GPAs, and the characteristics of admitted students. To Check out the academic profile and extracurricular details of admitted students at Columbia: Admitted Students