Figure 1: Total students applied to Carleton College versus total students admitted to Carleton College from the 1999-2000 admission cycle to the 2023-2024 admission cycle.
2014-15 (Class of 2018):
We then investigated the sharp decline in applicants following 2013-14 admissions cycle.
- Carleton experienced a decline in applicants for the Class of 2018, a trend shared by other colleges like Carleton. “‘Through informal conversations with colleges, one pattern among the top 12 highly selective liberal arts colleges is that we are experiencing a decline in applicants in the range of five to 10 percent,’ Thiboutot said” (Stein, Applications Fall 11% – The Carletonian).
- The Dean of Admissions at the time, Paul Thiboutot, hypothesized that a technical overhaul of the Common App that year may have prevented students from applying to as many schools as they had in the past