5Cs Release Class of 2022 Admissions Decisions

Each of the 5Cs recently announced its admissions rates, with several of them experiencing increases in applicants and some yielding record-low acceptance rates.

Pomona College, Scripps College, and Pitzer College saw a surge in the number of applicants this year, pushing down acceptance rates. The number of applicants for Harvey Mudd College stayed about the same, and decreased at Claremont McKenna College.

After enrolling 329 students in the class of 2021 — the largest incoming class in the college’s history — Scripps’ acceptance rate plummeted from 33 percent to 24.1 percent this year.

The college accepted fewer students this year and utilized the waitlist more to prevent having to house first-year students off-campus again due to over-enrollment. According to Scripps spokesperson Elizabeth Hamilton, the target class size for the class of 2022 is around 250 students.

Scripps admitted 90 out of 281 Early Decision applicants and 671 out of 2,917 Regular Decision applicants. ED applicants make up 35 percent of the acceptance pool.

Pomona had 10,245 applicants this year, the most in its history, pushing its acceptance rate down from 8.2 percent to a record low 7 percent. The target class size is 410-415 students from the regular acceptance pool and 20-25 students from the transfer pool, Pomona Director of Admissions Adam Sapp wrote in an email to TSL.

“Pomona admissions officers put in long hours over the course of many months to complete the application review process,” Sapp wrote. “We were humbled and excited to admit such a diverse and academically talented group of first-year and transfer students.”

Pomona did not provide data on early decision applicants to TSL before press time.

CMC’s admission rate dropped from 10.4 percent to 8.9 percent despite receiving fewer applications this year. The college admitted 558 students, compared to 658 students last year.

Pitzer received 4,358 applications this year, a 16 percent increase from last year. The college’s admission rate dropped from 15 percent to 13.2 percent, or 577 students, and is expecting a class size of 266-271, according to Yvonne Berumen, vice president of admissions and financial aid at Pitzer.

Pitzer admitted 135 out of 456 ED applicants and 441 out of 3902 RD applicants. ED applicants make up 23 percent of the acceptance pool.

HMC’s admission rate increased slightly from last year’s 13.9 percent to 14.5 percent. It received 4,101 applications, only slightly more than last year’s 4,078 applications. The target class size is 225 students, according to HMC Vice President of Admissions and Financial Aid Thyra Briggs.

HMC admitted 88 out of 465 ED applicants and 506 out of 3636 RD applicants. ED applicants make up 39 percent of the acceptance pool.

“We’re excited as always about this group of admitted students and for our campus to get to know them,” Briggs wrote. “We become very attached to these students throughout the process and love imagining how they’ll connect with the rest of our community.”

Pomona and CMC’s admitted student pools have similar proportions of first-generation students — around 19 percent — while HMC and Pitzer’s admitted pools are about 12 percent first-generation students. Scripps’ admitted pool is 7.3 percent first-generation students.

There is significant variation in the percentage of non-white students in each admitted student pool at each of the 5Cs. Pitzer admitted the lowest percentage at 43.3 percent of its admitted student pool, followed by Scripps with 45.3 percent, Pomona with 55.2 percent, and Mudd with the highest percentage of 62 percent.

CMC did not provide TSL with racial diversity data before press time.

The percentage of female students accepted was higher than the percentage of male students accepted at each of the 5Cs.

Pitzer had the highest female-to-male ratio in its acceptance pool — 57 percent female to 39.2 percent male. HMC also had a notably high female-to-male ratio in its acceptance pool — 54.5 percent female to 45.5 percent male.

“Female admitted students typically yield differently from men at STEM institutions,” Briggs wrote, explaining the higher percentage of female students in HMC’s acceptance pool.

Eleven students that deferred their acceptance in a previous year will also be joining this year’s class at Pomona. There are also six deferred-acceptance students at HMC, 14 at Scripps, and 15 at Pitzer. CMC did not provide data about students that have deferred their acceptance to TSL.