Earlier this week, my alma mater made the news: a breakdown of the total cost to attend Vanderbilt's engineering school found its way...

by Leigh Moore Hello, and here's hoping you teams are doing better than ours in the NCAA Tourney! While most of our readers won't be...

by Leigh Moore Welcome to March Madness, MCD-style! I realized a few years ago that the sample size offered by an NCAA tourney gives me...

There's March Madness and then there's March Madness. NCAA-Style As a native Kentuckian, I love March Madness.  No one would call me a...

by Leigh Moore February 12, 2024 Hi, college data fans! The next time you log into your portal, you will find the newest downloadable...

...and one for your consideration in the meantime... Hello, friends--It's Leigh here. Is everybody ready for Thanksgiving? Brad...

Despite my affinity for charts, visualizations, and lists, I confess that I have mixed feelings about the public’s growing interest in...

"Students don’t always attend the most selective college which has admitted them." Every year, I post the above reminder on my personal...

Hi, friends! I have a three-part blog post for you: Part 1 (for my fellow parents of the Class of 2023) Contextualizing the commitment If...

The culture seems resolved to believe that college admissions is a meritocracy, and I get it. World-class achievers have adhered...

Visualized below are all the applications filed at 81 colleges for Fall 2021. On the left are all the binding applications (Early...

Every student brings value to the process, an application “wallet” which holds up to six kinds of admissions currency: 1) the academic record; 2) standardized test scores; 3) extracurricular activities; 4) the ability to pay full price; 5) the commitment to attend if admitted, and 6) the capacity to meet a particular need of an institution. Decent performance on the first two measures alone will all but ensure admission to less selective universities, but what about highl

Defining Your Student's Objectives Hello, Moore College Data subscribers, and welcome to the blog. We decided to move our Viz of the Week to a blog format. Every post will bring you a new data visualization, and sometimes we'll chime in with commentary. Here we go! Defining Objectives--A Tool for Your Student Central to the mission of Moore College Data is redefining "fit" in tangible terms. For a school to be on your student's list, it should pass three tests: Is it affo

The framework of my counseling method in both philosophy and practice was scandalously simple: Every college on a student’s list must...

Last Updated on November 10, 2020 by Real College Matters What is the most profound thing you’ve ever heard? Who said it to you? Amy...

Last Updated on November 10, 2020 by Real College Matters About six months ago, I wrote a blog post about the most profound thing anyone...

Forgive me if I write too much about our older son during the next few weeks. It’s been an emotional year of “lasts,” and his journey through high school has and will continue to inform my counseling practices. Almost three years ago, Bob had just returned home at the end of his first year at boarding school. From my perspective, the kid was living large. In addition to all of his fundamental needs being met, he earned good grades, participated in exciting athletics, and enjo

Last Updated on November 10, 2020 by Real College Matters 23 April 2019 (Earlier post, revised for the Class of 2020 and their mentors)...

(Originally printed December 2020) by Leigh Moore Tens of thousands of early-round application decisions have already begun to appear on student portals, but many more of you still wait. December 15 usually marks the crescendo of December results. Students, are you ready? Anyone who knows me will tell you that I’m typically a touchy-feely encourager type, sometimes told I “care too much.” I am sorry if this message seems harsh in contrast; I write it only because I fear no o

by Leigh Moore Please forgive me for the long delay since my last post. It’s been a season of introspection for sure, one which culminated in the decision to phase out my advising practice in order to focus on writing projects. In an effort to describe the rationale for doing so, I created a document which has now grown to 10,700 words. The good thing is, I guess I’ve written my book. The bad thing is, it was supposed to be this blog post. My current state of affairs can be w