Columbia College of Columbia University is an Ivy League research university in the heart of New York City. It’s a top school, in a top city, on top of a hill on the island of Manhattan — basically the top of everything. There are 6,700 undergraduate students between Columbia College and Columbia Engineering. The student body is comprised of many of the best students in the world, and many of the best athletes including 46 Olympians, 16 NCAA Championship Teams, 60 Individual NCAA Champions, and even professional athletes in non-collegiate sports.
Applying to Columbia University as an International Student
Columbia College is the undergraduate liberal arts college of Columbia University, and SEAS is the undergraduate college of engineering. The university is home to nearly 35,000 students, 6,700 of whom are in Columbia College or SEAS. There are a little over 1,000 international undergraduate students between the two colleges, or about 16% of the students enrolled.
Demonstrated Interest at Columbia
If we had a dollar for every time we got a question about demonstrated interest, the millennial housing crisis would be no problem. Unfortunately, this scenario is just as far-fetched as the idea that following Columbia on Instagram will automatically get you into a school with a 5% acceptance rate.
What to Do if You've Been Waitlisted by Columbia 2024
Columbia is hard to get into – the Class of 2027 saw 57,129 applicants with an overall acceptance rate of 3.9%. Yeesh! Competitive! But if you’re here, you know that. If you’ve been waitlisted by Columbia, you know the path to admission is very hard, but not completely impossible. Today, we’re going to talk about the actionable things you can do to get off the waitlist.
How to Get into Columbia University
There are a lot of reasons to love Columbia University. It is a leader in research. It’s an Ivy League School. It is in New York City. It is also hard to get in. Last year, they had a 3.9% acceptance rate, making it one of the nation's most difficult schools to get into.
Deferred by Columbia Early Decision (2023-24)
So, you’ve been deferred by Columbia University. That’s a huge bummer. Instead of throwing yourself into action right away, we highly recommend giving yourself a moment to wallow. Eat a pint of ice cream, cry into your pillow, or cuddle with your pup. Allow yourself to feel all the feels, so that you can move on to getting things done.
Rejected Early Decision from Columbia 2023
Getting a rejection in the Early Decision round is definitely not easy. But the good news is, it’s really just the start, and that one rejection has no bearing on how you’re going to do with other, similarly competitive schools. The thing about Early Decision is it comes alone and it comes first. It’s sometimes easier to tolerate a rejection when it’s preceded by several acceptance letters. College admissions are extraordinarily competitive these days and the Ivies are just more competitive than any other time or place in history. That’s it. It doesn’t get harder. And Columbia in particular has just a 4% acceptance rate! So, if you’ve been rejected in the Early Decision round, don’t despair. We have some advice about how you might go forward. (And don’t worry, it’s really not that much more work!)
How to Write the Columbia University Supplement 2023-2024
Columbia University is one of the best universities in the world located in what is inarguably one of the best cities in the world — New York City. Columbia stands out in the Ivy League as having the tightest and most time-consuming distribution requirements, which they call the CORE Curriculum. The Columbia CORE is rooted in the tradition of a liberal arts education, and demands that students graduate with deep expertise alongside broad knowledge — you even need to take a swim test to graduate! In addition to the normal type of distribution requirements at most colleges where you pick language, science, math, and humanities classes from a long list of options, there are a few courses that every single student needs to take to graduate, such as Music Hum, a music theory course, and Art Hum, an art history course that requires significant flash card skills. This academic structure is ideal for high-performing students committed to the liberal arts methodology, and who want a well-rounded education at a top-tier university. The acceptance rate is just under 4%.
Columbia Extracurricular Guide
Reading List for Columbia STEM Majors
Many colleges ask applicants to share a favorite book, but Columbia University is one of the only schools that wants students to share their whole reading list — and not the books assigned in school. As one of the most famous and rigorous liberal arts schools in the country, Columbia looks for students with high intellectual potential. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that one sign of an intellectual person is that they choose to read more than what they are given for homework.
Reading List for Columbia Computer Science Majors
Columbia University has become notorious for asking applicants to list books that they’ve read not because that’s such a ridiculous request, but because they don’t also give you an opportunity to explain why it is you chose to read them. This has left many applicants scratching their heads, because how much can the application readers really learn from a list of titles and authors?
Reading List for Columbia Humanities Majors
Columbia University is one of the few colleges that asks students to submit a list of books applicants have read outside of required in-class reading. They know you’ve been working — they have seen your transcript — but they still want to know what you’re doing when you’re off the books and no one is shoving a book in your hand followed by quizzes and papers and expectations.
Reading List for Columbia Engineering Majors
Columbia University is one of the few colleges that asks applicants for a list of the books they’ve read, but that doesn’t also give you an opportunity to explain your choices. Instead, it’s a list devoid of additional context. Everything you have to say needs to be in the titles and authors, which means being strategic about what you include is critical.
Most Popular Majors at Columbia
Applying to Ivy League schools these days is no joke. And Columbia is right up there with the absolute best of them. A city campus in the heart of NYC, Columbia is a fantastic school for those interested in outstanding academics in one of the cultural epicenters of the world. But if you want to get into Columbia, you’re going to have to have an ironclad strategy. We help our students gear themselves towards specific programs within the nation’s top universities. Here are the most popular majors at Columbia:
Columbia Legacy Strategy
"Of course, my kid will go to Columbia, he's a legacy!" We hear this from parents probably every week. We work with a lot of Ivy League legacies. We hate to break it to you, but just being a legacy isn't the boost that many parents believe it is. Legacy admissions are cloaked in secrecy on purpose, so today we want to demystify legacy admissions at Columbia and what your legacy student needs to get in.
What to do if You're Waitlisted by Columbia 2023
Columbia University is a prestigious member of the Ivy League and receives over 60,000 applications each year for a place in its first-year class. Of those 60,000, less than 4% are accepted. That’s approximately 2,300 students each year. Unfortunately, far more than 2,000 students are completely qualified to go to Columbia. They have the grades. They have the activities. They have the experiences…but there just aren’t enough spots.
Transferring to Columbia University 2023
There is a pervasive myth in the world of transferring that if you couldn’t get in a college as a first-year, you can wait a year or two and have a better chance as a transfer. This can be true for some schools — especially small and medium-sized liberal arts schools — but it isn’t true for most of the top schools in the United States. Despite the fact the statistics rarely work out in favor of the idea that transferring is a back door into the best schools in the country, we’re constantly contacted by students (and their parents) who think that while the Ivy League wasn’t an option when they were a high school senior, it may be an option with some college under their belts.
Columbia Deferral Rate
Columbia College, the undergraduate college of Columbia University, is incredibly difficult to get into. In 2021, the overall acceptance rate was a minuscule 3.73%. If you want to get into Columbia, your best chance is to apply Early Decision, which came with a 10.10% acceptance rate in 2021 — but if you were deferred you already know this. You don’t need to know that your best shot was ED; you need to know what’s next.
How to Write The Columbia University Supplement 2022-2023
Columbia University is an old-school Ivy, founded in 1754. It’s the oldest higher ed institution in New York and the 5th oldest in the country. It’s medium-ish, with about 7,000 undergrads. Even though it’s in New York City, it has a beautiful campus nestled away in Morningside Heights. Their history and exclusive campus makes their uber-selective 5.1% acceptance rate make a lot of sense.
Columbia University Legacy Guide
“Does being a legacy help their chances of getting into Columbia?” It’s a question we get all the time from concerned alumni parents. Legacy admissions can be difficult to get to the bottom of. Many schools do not like to publish a lot of information about legacy admissions and Columbia is one of them. Every year we talk to admissions officers, go through data, and forecast admissions trends, and getting good information can be harder than it looks. So we wanted to break down some of the ins and out of legacy admissions at Columbia and try to answer some of our most asked questions.