Today's Consult comes from a new report on "Chasing the College Acceptance Letter" published by the Center for Public Education, an initiative of the National School Boards Association. It has some interesting tidbits and tips for parents and students:

The good news it reports is that students today actually have the same chance of getting into college today that they did a decade ago, and top applicants have a slightly better chance than they did of getting into a highly competitive college.

Here are a few pieces of advice from the report:

•"Having the right credentials to get into college doesn’t necessarily mean straight A’s. It just means students should earn decent grades, take college-preparatory courses, and perform well on their college entrance exams. Students who fulfill the above credentials should be able to get into a competitive, four-year college, even if it isn’t their dream college."

•"Taking more rigorous courses, especially in math and science, gives an applicant a better chance of getting into a competitive college than does raising his or her GPA. For instance, lower-achieving students could increase their chances by over 10 percent if they simply took trigonometry instead of stopping math at algebra II. Higher college entrance exam scores also increase a student’s chances."

•"In general, all applicants had slightly higher grades in 2004 than in 1992, but the higher GPAs did not increase their chances of getting into college; more rigorous courses and better scores on college entrance exams did."