Like many classes before them, the survey suggests the Class of 2018’s academic interests lean toward the social sciences.
Twenty-eight percent of surveyed freshmen reported that they intend to study either economics or government, the two most popular concentrations at the College, compared to 26 percent last year.
Economics, the most popular concentration among surveyed freshmen, was particularly desirable among surveyed recruited athletes. Thirty-five percent of recruits said that they intend to study the discipline, compared to 14 percent of non-recruits.
Gender also appears to play a role in concentration choice. More male respondents expressed interest in the physical sciences, computer science, mathematics, and engineering than female respondents, who were more like to indicate interest in life sciences.
And at a time when the University, and the higher education community at large, is grappling with a decade-long decline in humanities students, only 9 percent of respondents said that they plan to concentrate in the arts and humanities.
The survey results also found disparities among respondents in academic background. Surveyed males were more likely to have taken a higher-level math class than females, with 68 percent of male respondents indicating that they had taken a math class at the level of BC Calculus or higher, compared with 60 percent of female respondents.
High school study habits varied between respondents who went to private and public school. For instance, 32 percent of public school respondents reported studying fewer than 10 hours a week in high school, compared to 16 percent of non-denominational private school students.
Recruited athletes indicated that they spent less time overall studying in high school, with 35 percent saying that they studied fewer than 10 hours a week, compared to 26 percent of non-recruits.
Similar to last year’s class, 81 percent of respondents reported that their greatest source of pressure was their own expectations.
In the Clubs
Surveyed freshmen reported spending their time outside of their high school classrooms similarly to their sophomore counterparts.
Eighty-five percent of respondents reported involvement in community service, the most popular extracurricular activity. Female freshman respondents were more likely than their male peers to participate in drama and visual arts, though most activities were nearly evenly split in terms of gender.
Athletics was the second-most popular high school activity for the Class of 2018. Eleven percent of the respondents will continue competing at Harvard as recruited athletes, while a 9 percent of the class plans to walk onto a varsity sports team.
Athletics was the only high school extracurricular activity in which the respondents’ participation level varied with income level. While 54 percent of respondents from families with an annual combined income below $40,000 reported participating in athletics in high school, 81 percent of respondents from families making over $500,000 a year said the same, with the percentage increasing with every income bracket.
Nearly half of the respondents expressed some level of interest in joining a final club, sorority, or fraternity. Fourteen percent reported feeling “very interested.” Overall, male respondents reported a greater interest in joining a final club or Greek life than female respondents, who were more likely to report being unsure about joining one of those social organizations. Surveyed students from private schools reported greater interest in final clubs and Greek life than did students from public school, and students from rural upbringings were less likely to report interest in joining those organizations than their suburban and urban counterparts.
Levels of high school leadership varied little by legacy status, gender, income level, or school type, with a plurality of respondents—27 percent—leading one club in high school.
Eighty-four percent of surveyed freshmen reported being leaders of at least one club in high school.
—Staff writer Karl M. Aspelund can be reached at karl.aspelund@thecrimson.com. Follow him on Twitter @kma_crimson.
—Staff writer Meg P. Bernhard can be reached at meg.bernhard@thecrimson.com. Follow her on Twitter @Meg_Bernhard.