"Admissions Revolution"

asteriskea · October 31, 2006, 3:11pm

Well folks, ready or not, here he comes: According to the latest updates on the EC site, Thacker has unveiled his plans for the EC thinktank which include:

"Honorable Admissions": a web page for colleges to describe their successes in aligning admission practices with educational values Beyond Commercial Criteria-cooperating to get there. A College and University leaders is scheduled for February.

and (I think we can safely assume that this is where the bulk of the Mellon grant is going)

[quote]
Pivotal Research Project

EC is conducting pivotal research regarding the impact of college admission processes on student attitudes and behaviors. What follows is an excerpt from the research proposal's introduction. The research is slated to begin January 1, 2007 and conclude in May 2007. The project will be led by Lloyd Thacker and John Lee and Associates, and supported by an advisory team of Lynn Barendsen, Rick Detweiler, Howard Gardner, Don Hossler, Larry Litten, Pat McDonough, and Robert Massa. For more information please contact EC directly.

The college admission environment has changed significantly during the past twenty years: more stakeholders, more actors, more money, more media involvement, more recruiting, more messages, more testing, and more confusion. Amid this new landscape, there is growing concern that individual institutional actions, as well as the related activities of parents, schools, and other actors in what we refer to as the admission process may no longer be serving the values and purposes traditionally associated with higher education. What do students think colleges are seeking in admissible students? What are their perceptions of the admissions process and how are they responding to the perceived demands? How is their relationship with education-and society-shaped by their college admission expectations and experiences? What are students learning about themselves and society in this process? For example, are aspects of the process generally judged to be fair? And how do students behave if something is considered unfair?

Such questions shape this proposed exploratory examination of the impact of explicit admission practices and implicit messages on the attitudes and behaviors of students applying for college. It may be that the current selective college admission environment has led to adverse student attitudes and behaviors that contrast markedly with the espoused ideals of higher education. There are indications of unanticipated consequences such as excessive competition, dishonesty, disloyalty, narcissism, distorted views of fairness, and "gaming the system." Rather than taking courses of interest or pursuing activities for personal enrichment, students may simply be compelled by what they think colleges seek. This could have a profound effect on the way that incoming college students approach education as well as citizenship beyond college.

This exploratory study will serve two purposes: first, to determine whether there are indications of problems of significant scope to warrant a larger study. Second, the results from this initial study would help to design a more comprehensive research project. The results of this exploratory study will also be used to guide the Education Conservancy as it advocates for changes in the admission process.

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asteriskea · November 14, 2006, 6:53am

This important Inside Higher Ed article takes a close look at what admissions and financial aid officials, as well as guidance professionals from colleges and high schools nationwide had to say about "admission angst" as they gathered for the College Board’s annual meeting in San Diego this weekend:

[quote]
A Watershed Moment?

One of the more emotional sessions of the meeting was on “College Admissions in the 21st Century.” Don Hossler, a long-time admissions official who is now a professor of education at Indiana University at Bloomington, opened by asking whether college admissions is “at a watershed,” and suggested that it may well be so. He noted the testing debate, the push against early decision programs, the critique of “enrollment management” strategies, and a growing sense among college presidents that the admissions process and the awarding of financial aid are “out of control.”

He said that there was “a convergence of issues” that opened the possibility for real change.

Robert S. Lay, dean for enrollment management at Boston College, said that he saw the trends today combining in ways such that educators have “lost control of the process.”

Lay and others cited the growth in “stealth applications” — applications from students who prior to applying never had any official contact with anyone at the college. Such students believe they can figure out all they need to know by browsing a college’s Web site (and all the unofficial information that is present online), and they don’t want to hear from admissions offices. “There is a lack of trust students have in us,” Lay said.

One of the hot trends in admissions these days is pledging to take a “holistic” approach — with less focus on any one statistic and more of an effort to get a sense of applicant and fit. Lay didn’t criticize the approach, but said he worried that this could add to the anxiety and skepticism many have about admissions already. “A lot of this sounds like things going on in a black box, very subjective,” he said.

Barbara A. Gill, director of undergraduate admissions at the University of Maryland at College Park, said she also saw “a loss of public trust.” She noted that issues of access for low income students do not occupy many national leaders, and that Michigan just became the third state to vote down affirmative action — despite a wide consensus among admissions officials that affirmative action is necessary.

With all of this pressure and scrutiny, Gill also worried that admissions offices don’t have the depth they need. She noted that most applicants and parents don’t talk to admissions deans, but to rank and file admissions officers. Noting that many colleges have historically hired new graduates for those jobs, she said, “this just isn’t enough any more.”

Indeed, many at the meeting worried that their jobs have diverged from their values. John Barnhill, director of admissions and records at Florida State University, has been working in admissions for 30 years — and recalled his pride at his first title: “admissions counselor.” His job was counseling, not sales, he said, and success was “trying to find the best institution for the student,’ even if that meant lost applications or lost enrollment for your employer.

Now, he said, “students don’t want to be counseled,” at least not by anyone affiliated with a university admissions office.

Barnhill — to knowing nods in a standing-room-only audience — recalled fighting when his title was changed to “admissions officer.” And others joked about the title “enrollment management,” once viewed as the symbol of corporatization of college admissions, but now so common that many of the reformers in college admissions have “enrollment management” in their job titles, sometimes joking “I’m one of those evil enrollment management people.”

Even as Barnhill worried about lost values, he talked about the reality of functioning in admissions today. “I cower at my desk the day that U.S. News rankings come out,” he said. “If you are where your provost or president think you should be, you love the rankings,” he said, but most years at most institutions, you aren’t — and you spend a lot of time explaining why you aren’t, defending your practices, brainstorming about how to improve.

While blasting the rankings, Barnhill also said that “you have to admire their power,” in that they focus administrators’ attention on issues they might otherwise ignore. He said, for example, that because graduation rates are one focus of many rankings, college leaders pay more attention than they used to. “Our emphasis on retention has been propelled by rankings,” he said.

Others in the audience said that the crisis was made worse by the press, with reporters’ obsessions with elite universities, alleged “frenzies” that really apply only to the wealthiest families, presidents and provosts who are disconnected from the realities of admissions work, and a public that is in the dark about college generally and admissions.

James C. Blackburn, associate director of enrollment management services for the California State University System, said that no one is aware that “we don’t have a shortage of spaces,” just “a distribution issue” in which so many students are convinced that there are only a dozen or so institutions worth attending.

While most of those doing the talking at the session were from higher ed, many worried about trends in high schools. One private university official said that far too many of the innovative programs being touted at the College Board meeting “are reaching 50 students each,” while most public high schools in low income areas are ignored by higher education.

Mabel Freeman, assistant vice president for undergraduate admissions at Ohio State University, said that the counseling role is being killed off well before students reach college. So many counseling positions are being eliminated in high schools, she said, that many high school counselors have no way to maintain the kind of contact needed to be effective. College leaders need to make this issue their own, she said, as they have historically benefited from the good work done by high school counselors.

[/quote]

<a href="http://insidehighered.com/news/2006/11/14/collegeboard%5B/url%5D">http://insidehighered.com/news/2006/11/14/collegeboard</a>

asteriskea · November 16, 2006, 6:20am

The discussions about whether or not to ditch ED/EA continue whether or not the media sees it as a "hot topic" right now. The other week Swarthmore administrators decided "not to be on the bloody edge of change" and took a stand against change for the sake of change. Swarthmore's Jim Bock defends ED because the program is specfically designed to attract those students who find Swat to be their unequivocal first choice. Simply put, ED works well for Swarthmore and will be kept because of the:

[quote]
high degree of command in the process it gives admissions. ED gives us more control to shape each class, he said. Although Bock said that the ED applicant pool is more homogenous than the regular decision candidates, he did not regard this as a drawback. Most have the financial, educational and emotional resources to apply early, he said.

Another point that Bock stressed was that although the option of ED is intended to be binding, it is not iron-clad. Its not a legally binding contract, he said. As a result of this policy, Bock said that admissions usually loses one or two students that have applied ED. Theyve all chosen schools that have essentially given them a full ride, he said.

In spite of the concern that the ED process at the college caters exclusively to an applicant pool of a higher socioeconomic level, Bock said that each year he is continually assured of the quality,
depth and diversity of students that apply ED. This last year, more students of color applied than ever before, he said. In addition, he said that the fit exemplified in many successful applicants
Why Swarthmore? essays is evident in almost all of accepted ED students applications. We see it in RD, too, but we see it to a person in ED, he said.

In response to one question concerning ED I, Bock said that admissions would consider abolishing this option if it made sense for the college.

He also said that the college would not consider implementing early action in the near future. Schools end up admitting more students EA than they have room for in their class, he said.

[/quote]

<a href="http://phoenix.swarthmore.edu/2006-09-28/news/16343%5B/url%5D">http://phoenix.swarthmore.edu/2006-09-28/news/16343</a>

The "national conversation" about admission reform continues and this latest article reprinted in "The Phoenix" gives a good update on the current state of ED reform.

[quote]
It might have seemed like early admissions was toast after the University of Virginia, a public school, followed Harvard and Princeton in abolishing the practice this fall.

But no other school has jumped on the bandwagon in the past month, and some are saying the trend has petered out...

David Hawkins, director of public policy at the National Association for College Admission Counseling, said the fact that no school has dropped early admissions in the past month is a good indicator that the trend won't necessarily go that far.

One factor in other schools; hesitation may be the lack of evidence that the move will really abolish barriers for low-income students, he said.

There's just not the feeling that this is really going to solve the access puzzle, he added.

Nevertheless, Hawkins said, it is possible that a few more schools will make announcements in the near future but not a landslide of them.

Tony Pals, spokesman for the National Association of Independent Colleges and Universities, said higher-education experts had initially predicted that few schools would follow Harvard's lead.

I don't think it surprises anyone that no schools have dropped early admissions since the University of Virginia did in late September, he said.

But even if Harvards move has not sparked a domino effect, experts agree that it made a difference by thrusting the issue of admissions fairness into the limelight.

It has breathed life into an issue that was fairly dormant, Hawkins said.

Even if only a handful of institutions follow suit, every institution in the country has taken note of the issue and is asking itself, What can we do to help our lower-income students? Pals said.

The trend of dropping early admissions, no matter its size, is shaping the national conversation, he added.

And not everyone is as pessimistic about the trend's staying power.

Lloyd Thacker, executive director of the admissions-reform advocacy group Education Conservancy, said he expects more schools to change their policies.

I know that serious conversations are going on at schools with which [Penn] competes, Thacker said.

Eliminating early admissions is an opportunity for colleges to demonstrate their educational leadership and to contribute to the educational welfare of the country, he added.

Hawkins said earlier this year that in any event, schools will be less likely to make changes as it gets closer to January, when schools will have to begin creating brochures and filling out surveys for college guides for the next academic year.

Schools making a change for the fall of 2008 will most likely do it by this December, since doing it any later could affect the recruitment process, he added. If a school does not move by the end of this year, it's not likely to do so in the near future, he said.

[/quote]

<a href="http://phoenix.swarthmore.edu/2006-11-16/news/16594%5B/url%5D">http://phoenix.swarthmore.edu/2006-11-16/news/16594</a>

asteriskea · November 20, 2006, 9:23am

In this article, Robert Bardwell, a school counselor, president of the Massachusetts School Counselors Association, and adjunct professor for the school counseling program at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and Springfield College reminds us that "colleges with early admission programs constitute only 15 percent to 20 percent of all post-secondary schools in the country".

[quote]
Early admission programs have been around for decades. When first created, they were meant to give seniors who knew which college they wanted to attend a chance to hear early whether they would get in or not, eliminating the need to have to wait until the spring to hear. They were applying to their first-choice school.

Early decision is a binding contract, meaning that if a student is accepted under that plan, then they must withdraw applications from all other schools. Early action still allows a student to apply early and get an answer early, but does not bind the student to attend. Students can apply to multiple early action schools, whereas only one early decision application is allowed.

So what's the problem, and did these schools get rid of a good thing? Not everyone feels that early is necessarily good.

Opponents argue that when schools accept more than 30 percent of their classes through the early program and only 10 to 20 percent through the regular admission deadline, it is inherently unfair.

Furthermore, students who are disadvantaged in some way socioeconomically, first-generation college-bound or geographically) are less likely to apply early and thus not be equally represented among the early acceptances.

One report from the University of Virginia indicates that of the 947 members of the Class of 2010 who were accepted early, fewer than 20 applied for financial aid. Therefore, early programs are good for those who are already advantaged and simply perpetuate the cycle.

In addition, students applying early are not necessarily choosing that option for the right reasons. In many cases, they are just not ready to make such a commitment, especially for the binding option.

A lot can happen between late October and January, making a binding commitment a bad thing. Furthermore, society places a great deal of pressure on students to apply early somewhere. If applying early is the culture of a particular school, then students will go along with it even if it is not the right thing for them.

Parents are also to blame for this trend. In order to keep up with the Joneses, students are often forced to apply early even if they are not exactly sure where they might want to apply...

Early programs aren't all bad. In many cases, students apply to a school having thoroughly investigated and visited a college, making it clearly their first choice for the right reasons.

Not all colleges accept excessive numbers of students early. At Smith College, for example, only 24 percent of its freshman class this year was accepted early. Smith can also boast that 22 percent are first-generation, 30 percent are students of color, and 25 percent are Pell Grant recipients, meaning that the federal government has determined they are eligible for the most financial aid possible. These statistics clearly show that Smith is very conscious of the admissions decisions it makes and attempts to provide access fairly and equitably. Not all colleges and universities fall into this category.

It is also important to note that colleges with early admission programs constitute only 15 percent to 20 percent of all post-secondary schools in the country, so while the ones who have early programs get a great deal of the attention, the vast majority of schools have no such program and therefore have a single deadline. Unfortunately, the majority of the schools with early programs are also the more prestigious colleges so they tend to overshadow the others.

Whether additional schools will end their early admission programs remains to be seen. The fact that some have examined their policies and made changes, whatever the reason, shows that they are trying to be conscious of the reasons why they do what they do.

Students of all backgrounds and financial abilities should have equal access to college regardless of which admissions decision program a college adheres to. However, we need to do a better job eliminating barriers to post-secondary education for all of our students

[/quote]

<a href="http://www.masslive.com/metroeastplus/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-2/1163496126245800.xml&coll=1%5B/url%5D">http://www.masslive.com/metroeastplus/republican/index.ssf?/base/news-2/1163496126245800.xml&coll=1</a>

vonlost · November 20, 2006, 10:12am

"Early decision is a binding contract"

For some schools, if there is a financial need grant included, early decision is an offer that can be rejected without consequence. E.g., the EFC might require liquidation of an asset that the family is unable or unwilling to perform.

asteriskea · November 30, 2006, 10:02am

Add Northwestern and the University of Chicago to the list of HE institutions that have formally announced they will keep their early decision programs for now.

Here is a link and excerpts from an article in "The Harvard Crimson" entitled "Playing Catch-Up" on the end of early decision at Harvard and the current admissions frenzy that features Sally Rubenstine from CC, as well as L. Thacker of the EC.:

[quote]
IS ENDING EARLY ACTION ENOUGH?

Students confused by the announcement pointed out that Early Action (EA) is non-binding, which means students from low-income backgrounds can still compare financial aid packages at the end of the process. Some see EA as the lesser evil to Early Decision: a win-win situation that alleviates pressure early in the process for the well-prepared, without disadvantaging the less-privileged.

That is, if it’s assumed that the less-privileged participate at all. Perhaps the most important message that Harvard is sending is that there are many students who don’t even have the wherewithal to enter a game that starts earlier and earlier.

The growing information gap is the most compelling consequence of this admission process. Fitzsimmons cites disparities in college counseling to illustrate this point.

“Nationally, the average ratio of counselees to counselors is about 500 to one,” he says. “In poor communities, because of budget cutbacks there are no longer any counselors at all. In affluent communities, the ratio is as low as 40 or 50 to one. Many students have private counselors ”

A recent poll by The Chronicle of Higher Education showed that 94 percent of pollees believed that “every high-school student who wants a four-year college degree should have the opportunity to earn one.” Another 52 percent agreed that a college degree was “essential for success in our society.”

The need for higher education no longer has the fuzzy haloed status of an American dream: it’s a necessary reality. And Fitzsimmons and other opponents of Early Action claim that equalizing the process will benefit an increasing number of disadvantaged students.

“This isn’t just a nice thing to do,” says Fitzsimmons. “If America doesn’t take advantage of all the talents of all the members now, it will be a less significant factor in the world in one, two or three generations.”...

‘STUDENT-HOOD HAS BEEN VIOLATED’

While the current college application certainly requires a lot of work on the parent’s part, it’s usually the pressure involved at the student’s end that has become a lightning rod for criticism.

“There aren’t enough hours in the day for me to tell you what is wrong with the current admissions process,” says Sally F. Rubenstine, Senior Counselor and Editor at CollegeConfidential.com. “All the anxiety that it brings our children that doesn’t need to be there!”

This anxiety manifests itself daily on the CollegeConfidential.com discussion forums, which claims to be the “most popular on the web.”

The question “What are my chances?” litters the discussions groups. They feature students who post their statistics online for others to evaluate. In one Harvard thread, a student who boasted a 2350 on the SAT I, triple 800s on the SAT IIs, and runs a “self-started computer business,” wonded whether he might get into Harvard Early Action.

Forget about professional counseling. Many high school students today are attempting to learn on their own what it takes to get in. The same movement that drives the multi-million dollar test-prep takes a more personal form in websites like CollegeConfidential.com. For these students, CollegeConfidential.com is not only a source for information, but a forum for therapy...

STUDENTS OR VICTIMS?

“Students have been victims. They’ve been reduced to consumers!” says Lloyd Thacker, the founder the Education Conservancy, a nonprofit that wants to right what’s wrong with the college application process. Thacker believes that today’s process is run on a consumer model in which colleges attract students with gimmicks like high SAT averages, competitive rankings, and preferential and early programs.

“Student-hood has been violated,” says Thacker.

Student-what? “Student-hood is a concept that students make learning happen,” says Thacker, “It’s curiosity, hard work, risk-taking. Those things are not celebrated by current admission offices.”

Harvard and other colleges are paying attention. Thacker recalls dashing off a “one-sentence abstract” for a book on college admissions.

“‘The commercialization of college admissions has created a crisis by undermining educational values.’ I wrote it and sent it off to 12 deans of admissions and college presidents—I put it through spell-check first, of course—e-mailed it, and within three days, 10 out of the 12 responded.”

The book, “College Unranked: Ending the College Admissions Frenzy,” was at first self-published because “the publishers wanted to make it into a how-to-beat the system book, and it was a how not-to book,” says Thacker. His book is now published by Harvard University Press.

ON THE HORIZON

The Early Action deadline was Nov. 1, and though the admissions office doesn’t promise a decision until Dec. 15, the applicants have trouble focusing on anything else.

“I’m trying not to think about the application: something I should have done or should have left out. We try not to talk about it too much,” says Nehamas. He was contacted for an interview, but he didn’t practice for it. Part of it might be because he’s too busy: his work on the school newspaper means that he often comes home after eleven at night. Another part is his personal philosophy.

“Preparing for an interview is always a bad idea. I’m just trying to come off as an interesting person. One of my friends got one of those books ‘College Trade Secrets’ or something, but I really just want to be myself, I’m just going to act normally,” Nehamas says.

On the other side of the country, Zambrano is worried. He’s received his SAT scores from October; he scored a 1990. He had hoped to break 2000.

The emphasis on SAT scores also draws ample criticism from those who think such numbers handicap disadvantaged students.

“I’m not even talking about knowing about the EA or ED: it’s something as simple as meeting basic requirements,” says Jolene A. Lane, executive director of LEDA. “Philosophically, anyone can participate in the college process. But in reality people don’t have the information to apply. There are counselors who’ve never heard of SAT IIs. Students are eliminated from the candidate pool because of a lack of information about and emphasis on tests.”

Fitzsimmons points out, though, that the relationship between socioeconomic levels and test scores is part of why the admissions office looks at students holistically, taking students’ backgrounds into account .

That’s good news for Zambrano, who is hoping for “a little bit of slack on the SAT scores.” Perhaps they’ll put more weight on other parts of his applications, like his essays, which he sees as the strongest part of his application: “It’s not numbers and letters,” he says. “It’s the closest they can get to actually knowing me as a person rather than from a computer screen or numbers.”

Appropriately, Harvard is going through the same process; like applicants, they are attempting to define their own purpose and value.

“It seems to be very important to a lot of people, and it’s good that higher education is important,” Susan D. Glimcher, Nehamas’ mother, says, “I sometimes wonder about the reasons, like you need to have a good education to make a lot of money. For me it goes without saying that education goes well beyond that. It’s very good that education’s become very important, you sometimes wonder why people are valuing it.”

It’s a given today that higher education is important, but the reasons as to why are still being debated. The outcomes of the debate are what has and what will guide the changes college application process...

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<a href="http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=516045%5B/url%5D">http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=516045</a>

asteriskea · December 2, 2006, 7:15am

Inside Higher Ed: "Chicago Students Rally to Be Uncommon"

[quote]
At many colleges, students worry about the impact of rankings on the prestige associated with their degree. At the University of Chicago, hundreds of students have joined a protest movement in recent weeks, worried that the university is selling its soul to get a higher ranking from U.S. News & World Report...

For many Chicago students, going after such applicants seems degrading to their values even though Chicago applicants would still have to complete the universitys own application essay. If students are going to attend a rigorous institution, the students say, they should be able to handle a rigorous application. If you are smart and dont want to work hard, then go to Harvard, or better yet, go to Brown, said Roger Fierro, a senior who is chair of the Prospective Students Advisory Committee. We think our application is unique and we want to defend it.

Part of the students anger is that Chicago has until now not only taken pride in its application, but presented it as the antithesis of the Common Application. The Chicago application is called the Uncommon Application. And Theodore A. ONeill, dean of admissions at Chicago, has been highly critical of the move toward conformity in college admissions. At last years meeting of the College Board, ONeill devoted much of a talk to mocking the Common Application, saying that it was part of what encouraged students to write utterly boring application essays, and calling on colleges to reject its use.

ONeill said in an interview Thursday that the decision was not forced on him, although many at Chicago assume that it was. The shift at Chicago follows the arrival of a new president, Robert J. Zimmer, who in several interviews upon arriving spoke of the need to attract more applicants. ONeill is highly outspoken and highly respected by admissions officers nationally. After his talk at the College Board last year, several in the audience said that they wished they could get away with being as frank and idealistic as he is. So the change in policy worries some admissions observers.

If Chicago doesnt listen to its students and to what ONeill previously said, that would be very troubling, said Lloyd Thacker, founder of the Education Conservancy, a group devoted to making the college admissions process more rooted in educational values. Thacker said he saw the quest for more applications as a part of a disturbing trend of colleges trying to identify more potential students to reject, so that a college appears to be more selective than it is, and goes up in the rankings.

Thacker said that many college embrace this ranksters approach, but that it makes no sense educationally. If Chicagos application helped prospective students get a good feel for the college and its values and sent applicants who didnt share those values elsewhere it was doing just the right thing, Thacker said.

Kids are either excited by the application for the right reasons or turned off for the right reasons, he said.

The Common Application can be useful for colleges that want the same kinds of applicants as many other colleges, Thacker said. But he said American higher education would be better off if more colleges werent trying to be the same, and in fact tried to be unique and to find good matches, not more people to reject.

The best news in the controversy, Thacker said, was the idea that students are getting involved and defending the current application. And they are indeed getting involved. A protest is planned for today. T-shirts are being sold that say We Are Uncommon. More than 1,000 students have joined a Facebook group opposed to the change (while 12 have joined a group favoring the change). As of Thursday evening, 1,001 students and alumni had signed an online petition opposing the adoption of the Common Application. In comments students added to their signatures, many of them said that they applied to Chicago because of its unique application and viewed the shift as encouraging laziness or conformity...

Much of the opposition concerns a sense that the university isnt comfortable with its reputation as a haven for intellectuals, who thrive more on work than fun, and who are more likely to be future professors than future millionaires. In an editorial called Who Wants to Go to UPenn, Anyway?, the student newspaper, the Chicago Maroon, wrote that the students fighting the change feared that the university could become a generic elite private university.

Luis Lara, a junior history major who helped organize the protest movement, said that he got angry as soon as he heard of the plan to abandon the Uncommon Application. They are saying that they want to reach more people, and I think this would get a higher number of applicants, but just so we could go up in the rankings, he said. If they are willing to do this one thing for the numbers and rankings, what else might they do?

In fact, much of the most unique part of Chicagos application the essay will stay the same, and would have to be filled out by applicants in addition to the Common Application with its essay. The Chicago application currently features two short essays that tend to stay largely the same from year to year, and one longer essay in which students have a choice of prompts, which change from year to year. One of the short essays is about why a student wants to attend Chicago, and the other is about student favorites. Students are asked to write about favorite books, poems, authors, films, plays, pieces of music, musicians, performers, paintings, artists, magazines or newspapers. Students are told to pick one category to explain their favorite, several or another favorite item for their essay.

ONeill said that when the shift takes place, probably in the fall of 2008 one of the short essays would have to be dropped. He said it would probably be the favorites essay...

In the interview Thursday, ONeill spoke with characteristic passion about the current application, which is longer and more personalized in its explanations than the Common Application. Of Chicagos application, he said, I like the look of it. I like the feel of it. I like the way we explain things. I like our essays. He also confirmed the comments made by so many students in the two weeks since plans for a change became known. He said that many students tell him every year that it was the application that sold them on the university.

But ONeill also noted that he doesnt tend to hear from the students who never applied. How many students get to December 30 and say that they cant do one more essay? he asked. There have always been internal critics at the university, he said, who have told him, Look you think this thing is so cool, but it scares kids off. He said he especially worried about scaring off applicants who may be the first in their families to go to college, although he acknowledged that Chicago of late has been doing well at diversifying its student body and attracting more applicants with its unique application.

Chicago has no shortage of applicants. In the most recent year, 9,500 applied; 3,600 were admitted, and 1,250 enrolled. But ONeill said he agreed with the goal that there should be more applicants I want many more smart kids to apply but denied that rankings had anything to do with that desire, noting that he has been pushing for years to attract more applicants.

[/quote]

asteriskea · December 8, 2006, 4:15am

In the world of college rankings we might well expect a shake-up in the offing as the "Rankings Tail Wags the Dog" now that changes in the ranking system behind the mother of all ranking system, USN&WR, are released- the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching review of the Carnegie Classifications (used to group colleges for institutional research, participation in programs, and to create peer groups) now gives researchers and educators unprecedented flexibility to group colleges in different ways and attempts to move away from the idea that there is one single way to group colleges.

[quote]
How would the new system affect the U.S. News & World Report rankings? The latter group is now getting its answer. U.S. News, which has based its ranking system on the Carnegie Classifications, will continue to do so even if that means some colleges will find themselves in new groupings next year in the magazines popular (and widely criticized) rankings.

And that announcement in turn appears likely to prompt more colleges to appeal their Carnegie Classification status for reasons having very little to do with the actual classifications. Several institutions have already made successful appeals and more are expected.

The reason for the frenzy is that Carnegie this year decided to try to make its classifications (at least the basic institutional part that is the outgrowth of the traditional classifications) more consistent. In the past, Carnegie had allowed dozens of institutions that identified in one way (typically as liberal arts colleges) to stay in the baccalaureate categories even if they offered significant numbers of masters degrees. This pleased colleges that wanted to be grouped in the top U.S. News category for liberal arts colleges. But this year, Carnegie decided to enforce its rules, and colleges that met certain tests were placed in masters categories much to the horror of college officials.

They have since been lobbying U.S. News to ignore the latest Carnegie changes while also lobbying Carnegie to let them stay as strictly undergraduate colleges.

Robert J. Morse, director of data research for U.S. News, said Monday that the magazine has decided to go with Carnegies system even if colleges are moved as a result. Carnegie, he said, sets the standard for higher education and it would not be our role to disagree with that standard.

If colleges unhappy about their Carnegie placements can get the foundation to change them, U.S. News will honor the changes, Morse said. But the decisions will be Carnegies. Were not going to be in the appeals business, he said.

Already, he noted, four colleges have convinced Carnegie to keep them out of masters categories: Bryn Mawr College, Bucknell University, Furman University and Smith College.

For the Carnegie Foundation, which never intended its classifications to be used for magazine rankings, more appeals are taking place and more are expected.

Alexander C. McCormick, a senior scholar at Carnegie who directs the classifications, said that the foundation was now in the position of having some colleges focus on a single part of its classification just what it was trying to avoid with the more sophisticated system it has just adopted. We intentionally introduced a whole set of classifications in explicit acknowledgment that a single classification isnt up to capturing the complexity, he said.

Carnegie will consider appeals based on the validity of the colleges claims, not the impact on rankings, McCormick said. Of the U.S. News decision, he said that it does end up being a fairly powerful influence focusing attention on this one classification that is 36 years old, he said. There are better ways to do it.

How does Carnegie feel about having colleges come to it motivated by rankings? We dont think our classification decisions should be driven by how one organization is using or misusing the classification, he said. McCormick added, however, that the foundation has offered to help U.S. News make better sense of our classifications and that he is still hopeful that they will take us up on that offer.

[/quote]

<a href="http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2006/10/17/usnews%5B/url%5D">http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2006/10/17/usnews</a>

<a href="http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/classifications/index.asp%5B/url%5D">http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/classifications/index.asp</a>

<a href="http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/news/sub.asp?key=51&subkey=2126%5B/url%5D">http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/news/sub.asp?key=51&subkey=2126</a>

calmom · December 8, 2006, 5:02am

The Carnegie site is a pretty cool tool -- try searching by institution name, here:
<a href="http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/classifications/index.asp?key=782%5B/url%5D">http://www.carnegiefoundation.org/classifications/index.asp?key=782</a>

Then check the criteria for that college that interest you, and click, "Find Similar" -- interesting to see what comes up. Some intriguing regroupings of colleges.

(And if it ends up shaking up the US News rankings somewhat... fine. Maybe it will force people to start thinking beyond that list).

asteriskea · December 15, 2006, 5:38am

From the Harvard Crimson: "College prepares for life without Early Action as Class of 2011 sees greater diversity"

[quote]
While Harvard has experienced positive returns in its final year of single-choice early admissions, Fitzsimmons said he is very excited for next years round of admissions and the changes it will bring.

We will now be out on the road a lot more, travelling through October and until December instead of winding down at the end of October, he said, adding that College admissions officers will be travelling with Princeton and the University of Virginia, which have both also given up early admission.

Fitzsimmons said the additional travel time will allow his office to expand horizons and visit schools that rarely or never send students to Harvard.

We have a search list of around 80,000 promising students and with more time we can tap into some of those students from those high schools that almost never send people our way, he said. It could make a real difference both in the academic quality and economic-slash-ethnic diversity of our class.

The admissions office is not sure how this new application process will affect applicant numbers.

Instead of 19,000 regular [decision applicants], well have 23,000 or 24,000 overall applicants, I think, but who knows what the number might be, Fitzsimmons said.

There is, however, the concern that applicant numbers might decrease as potential students may apply and accept early decisions at other schools such as Yale and Stanford.

Thats been an issue for a very long time, he said. Previously we were always faced with the idea that some very good students would end up choosing binding early decisions at other universities instead of applying here.

This is one of the reasons why we look at this as an experiment, Fitzsimmons added. We have to be realistic. If we dont end up as strong as we are now or stronger, we will have to consider going back to [early action], but we hope that this doesnt turn out to be the case.

[/quote]

<a href="http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=516472%5B/url%5D">http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=516472</a>

asteriskea · December 15, 2006, 8:36am

Interesting trend-watching article in yesterday's WS Journal: "Colleges Expand Early Admissions" focus is on those colleges that now actively promote early decision programs - many offer second round early decision, special fast-tracked applications and sometimes both. Many colleges have even added new terms, like "instant decision," to the expanding vocabulary of college admissions. The article highlights the University of Vermont and Tulane University which now feature "snap apps" -- unsolicited applications that include a promise of a faster-than-usual decision and a waived application fee. Also, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., has added yet another option to early decision and early action options - a streamlined process, dubbed "Candidate's Choice" aimed at students who have visited or expressed interest in the school. Rensselaer promises "fewer questions" on the application and an admissions decision within 28 days, faster than regular admissions, where rulings take about three months.

"Ignoring Harvard and Princeton, Many Schools Add Ways for Students to Get a Quick Decision"

[quote]
Unwilling to concede an edge in nabbing top students and unmoved by arguments that their policies are inequitable, many colleges have redoubled their commitment to early admission. In fact, many schools have come up with inventive new variations on early decision, whereby students get a quick answer and an advantage in the admissions process...

At Dickinson College in Carlisle, Pa., high-school seniors have no less than five different options for applying, and four of them begin with the word "early."

"We get more and better students this way," says Dickinson's dean of admissions, Seth Allen. He notes that when Harvard and Princeton announced they were doing away with early admissions, he attempted to calculate how Dickinson would fare if it made a similar move. "If we were to do that, Dickinson would have admitted, boy, 70% more students than we did last year" to fill up the freshman class, says Mr. Allen. "I think we would have far less control in crafting the makeup of the class, in order to make sure it's diverse."...

"It's a double-edged sword," says Earl Retif, dean of admissions at Tulane. "You're trying to make it customer friendly, but then because it's easier, students can apply without as much thought. Do they actually want to come here, or are they just putting another stamp on another envelope?"

[/quote]

<a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB116606695222949768-search.html?KEYWORDS=Colleges+Expand+Early+Admissions&COLLECTION=wsjie/6month%5B/url%5D">http://online.wsj.com/article/SB116606695222949768-search.html?KEYWORDS=Colleges+Expand+Early+Admissions&COLLECTION=wsjie/6month</a>

edad · December 15, 2006, 10:11am

I am really not sure I understand the logic involved in eliminating EA/ED programs. As I understand it, eliminating these options is supposed to help under-advantaged applicants. I am not sure I understand why.

It would seem that many do appreciate early acceptances. Many of these kids hold off submitting a lot of additional applications. Without EA/ED, I suspect the number of applications/student will continue to skyrocket. I wonder if submitting a lot of applications will be difficult for the under-advantaged. I would think so.

bethievt · December 15, 2006, 7:56pm

For ED, it's about financial aid, I thought. How can you commit to a school before you know the FA package? I don't know any kids from my son's HS who has gone ED without the knowledge that parents (or grandparents) could come up with COA. That limits lower and middle income kids.

MarathonMan88 · December 15, 2006, 9:09pm

I think that--in addition giving up the ability to compare FA offers that bethivt mentioned--the other part of the logic of helping less affluent students by eliminating ED is that you have to be fairly savvy to get it all together to apply ED: first you need to realize that you get an admissions advantage by using ED programs. Then, you almost surely need to take either the SATs and SATIIs (for the types of colleges that have eliminated ED) in your junior year, have all the research done, have thought about interviews, etc. The sort of coaching that makes this possible is more typical of prep schools and affluent suburban high schools than schools in more economically hard-pressed areas.

asteriskea · January 7, 2007, 8:59am

Just to round out the Y in HP S - Yale will keep its early action program.

Here is an interesting excerpt from the Q&A with Rick Levin article that appeared in the Yale alumni magazine to answer "Why Yale is Keeping Early Admissions":

[quote]
Y: In 2002, you told the alumni magazine you would like to see early admissions eliminated everywhere.

L: I emphasized that every school would have to eliminate early admissions to achieve the desired result. But this is very unlikely to happen. If Yale were to eliminate early admissions now, it is most likely that we would end up with a system where the top three or five schools had no early program, and just about everybody else did. That wouldn't solve many problems and would create some new ones.

"What Harvard has done by eliminating early action gives applicants fewer options."

And I have learned some things since 2002. When we sent our admissions officers out recruiting this year, we said, "Find out what placement counselors and school principals think we should do about early action." Opinions were divided, but a great many thought Yale should keep its early action program and not follow Harvard and Princeton.

Why did these counselors and principals think this? For many reasons, but here's one. Let's say you are a counselor in a high school with a lot of outstanding, well-prepared students. If none of the top schools had an early admissions program, the very best students would likely apply to three or four of the top schools each, and possibly to one or two others in the next tier of schools. They would tend to collect multiple offers, causing students who ranked slightly lower to be placed on waiting lists or rejected -- not just at the top schools, but even at schools in the next tier down. This wouldn't be a very desirable outcome.

A more fundamental lesson is this: changing deadlines and decision dates will rearrange the stresses associated with the admissions processes, but it won't eliminate them.

Finally, by contrast to their divided opinion on eliminating early action, the same counselors and principals were in '02-'03 virtually unanimous in their support of Yale eliminating binding early decision. Our switch to non-binding early action gave applicants more options. What Harvard has done by eliminating early action gives applicants fewer options.

[/quote]

<a href="http://www.yalealumnimagazine.com/issues/2007_01/q_a.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.yalealumnimagazine.com/issues/2007_01/q_a.html</a>

bluebayou · January 7, 2007, 11:42am

[quote]
...changing deadlines and decision dates will rearrange the stresses associated with the admissions processes, but it won't eliminate them....

[/quote]

This is what I've been saying all along. The vast majority of kids in California apply to the state schools, with a application deadline of Nov. 30 -- both the UCs and the Cal States use a Nov 30 deadline. Moving the deadline up for EA/ED, or back 30 days is rather inconsequential for most kids, particularly the go-getters that are attractive to HPSM, et al.

bethievt: Princeton's no loan policy means that the only self-help in the finaid package might be Work Study, which surely helps middle income families -- indeed, as mini has pointed out, the no-loan policy is a defacto discount to middle income families. btw: the Dec acceptance arrives with an initial finaid offer.

asteriskea · January 9, 2007, 5:33am

I think we all can agree that merely shifting deadlines and decision dates will do nothing to allay the inherent stresses embedded in the college admission process - and one would hope that, at this point, the admissions revolution EA-ED argument would shift focus to deal with the stress that can be caused by too many options and too many dates and deadlines. Obviously, cogent arguments can be made to defend all of these early programs but, quite frankly, stress can be induced and exacerbated when colleges adopt a confusing and even conflicting array of admission paradigms. For this reason, arguments made by educators like Bruce Poch in favor of binding ED programs make a great deal of sense but non-binding EDs, SCEA, EA, EN, EDII, as well as other interim options are popular and do relieve stress for those lucky enough to be accepted.

Of course at present, the aim of admissions reform is not to alleviate stress. The key point is that Yale can not afford to drop its early-admissions program unless "a critical number" of colleges do the same. Clearly, that has not happened. So for now, it is just this "wait and see" attitude that shapes how we must view admissions reform - and, of course, in pragmatic terms, that simply means that we have to do what we always had to do - come to terms with all the available options- cope, and make the best of it. In the context of Yale's corporation and faculty committee decision not to end early admissions - for now- it is a good time to re-read an excerpt of an article that appeared in the Yale Daily News this past Sept.:

[quote]
... Levin said Harvard's trial period without early admissions - currently set to last for two to three years - will continue to inform Yale's shifting opinion of the program.

"Now we have a live experiment," Levin said. "Harvard has made a move, and we'll be thinking hard about it and watching it closely. We'll certainly be looking at that option this year in light of Harvard's decision. I wouldn't want to predict how it would come out."

This decision marks only the most recent shift in Yale's - particularly Levin's - take on early admissions. In 2001, when Yale still maintained a binding early decision program, Levin ignited a national debate by criticizing such programs, saying that early admissions should be abolished altogether. Months later, the University switched to a single-choice early action program, and other schools, including Harvard and Stanford, soon followed suit.

In a field where the University once seemed poised to set the pace among its peer institutions, officials at Yale now seem more inclined to await the effect of Harvard's decision on its applicant pool and, perhaps more importantly, its yield, which has bested Yale's in recent years. That wait-and-see approach mirrors the way Yale went about reforming its financial aid policy in 2004 - announcing changes in March 2005, a year after Harvard saw a spike in applicants following similar reforms.

Then as now, Harvard's stated goal was to bolster recruitment among students from low-income backgrounds, a perennial goal for the nation's top schools. But Yale's consideration of an end to early admissions follows a statement Levin issued earlier this week arguing that it is unclear whether such a change will markedly aid this goal.

"It is not clear that eliminating Early Admissions will result in the admission of more students from low-income families," Levin said in the statement. "Since such students are underrepresented in the Ivy League applicant pool, what is really needed is what Harvard, Yale and others have been doing in recent years: that is making efforts to increase the pool of low-income students who apply and strengthening the financial aid packages they receive."

Barmak Nassirian, associate executive director of the American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers, said Levin should seek to deliberate on the early admissions question for as long as is necessary.

"You wouldn't want a president who runs Yale based on what Harvard does," Nassirian said. "It is actually quite frankly the kind of thoughtful reaction you would want from a university president. You don't want him to jump to conclusions, don't want him to turn the institution on a dime."

David Hawkins, the director of public policy at the National Association for College Admission Counseling, said he thinks it is unlikely that Harvard's move will spark a paradigm shift in other schools' admissions policies. Early admissions is attractive to universities due to the increasing difficulty in recent years in predicting the yield of students who accept an offer of admission, Hawkins said, and most universities are unlikely to spurn short-term yield gains in favor of long-term growth in low-income recruiting.

"Colleges from Ivy Leagues on down would be hesitant to completely abandon these policies for fear of losing a significant percentage of applicants to schools that do have early admissions program," Hawkins said.

[/quote]

<a href="http://www.yaledailynews.com/Article.aspx?ArticleID=33211%5B/url%5D">http://www.yaledailynews.com/Article.aspx?ArticleID=33211</a>

asteriskea · January 16, 2007, 7:09am

Good update article focusing on PA.- Penn, Swarthmore, Bryn Mawr, and Dickinson, on the why "Most colleges continuing to admit early" :

[quote]
Tossing out early-decision programs wholesale won't magically swing open the doors of higher education to low-income students, because not all schools have the same circumstances as Harvard and Princeton, said Robert J. Massa, vice president of enrollment and college relations at Dickinson College in Carlisle.

"I am very concerned that the 800-pound gorillas of higher education have prejudiced the market against early decision," Massa said.

Eliminating the programs would flood colleges with applications, make the process more cumbersome, and deprive students of the chance to win admission early to their first-choice institution.

"I don't need to get more applications so I can turn kids down. I need to get the right applications from kids who want to be here," Massa said.

Early-decision programs, which have become increasingly popular in recent years, yielding record numbers of applications, allow students to be admitted to their first-choice colleges months before others apply. But students can apply to only one school and must attend it if they can afford it.

That's exactly what some want.

"One of the reasons we feel people are happy here is because of early decision," said University of Pennsylvania senior Jeff Greenwald of Shaker Heights, Ohio.

"It was the only school where all my interests coincided," said Greenwald, the departing executive editor of the Daily Pennsylvanian, the student newspaper. He cited the college's first-rate student newspaper, club hockey, and a strong English department.

Proponents of early decision also say it saves students and parents time and money by requiring only one application.

Those opposed say early decision unfairly gives the wealthy and most astute students an edge. Lower-income students are underrepresented in early-decision pools at some colleges; they tend not to apply early because they want to compare financial aid offers.

"Less than 10 percent of the entire pool of students applying for financial aid were in the early-decision pool," said Janet Lavin Rapelye, Princeton's dean of admission. "That was very true of students of color, too. We didn't think it was fair. We're not going to have a special process for those of you who are privileged and can get here first."

Bruce Slater, managing editor of the Journal of Blacks in Higher Education, said: "Our position is that if there was no early decision at any institution, it probably would be better for black kids on the whole. Early decision is used more by affluent white kids who don't have to worry about financial aid."

Students who apply through early decision are more likely to be accepted than those in the regular pool. At schools such as Penn, nearly half of the freshman class is from early applicants.

Critics also say the first semester of their senior year is too early for high school students to commit to one college.

Penn junior Shawn Safvi, 20, of Chapel Hill, N.C., incoming editor of the Penn newspaper, didn't apply early.

Because of that, he said, he saved thousands of dollars by confronting Penn - his first choice - with a better financial aid offer he had received from Columbia. Penn matched it.

"Had I applied early to Penn, I wouldn't have been able to do that," Safvi said.

Claudia Gard, a guidance counselor at Masterman - an academic magnet school in Philadelphia - has qualms about early decision for most teens.

"In general, I put it out there for kids to know about it, but I'm hesitant to recommend it unless the kid is positive in all respects," she said...

Though only 7 percent of the nation's four-year colleges - about 200 - use early decision, many are high-caliber, well-known institutions. The practice has been around for decades, but it became increasingly popular in the mid-1990s when several Ivy League schools adopted it. Many schools say it helps with planning for the size and scope of the freshman class.

The policies also improve some colleges' rankings in U.S. News and World Report because they appear more selective.

At Penn, officials say the policy enhances the quality of the student body.

"Some of our surveys have found that students in that category... tend to be more involved on campus, tend to do at or a little above the average performance in the classroom, and obviously are even more loyal to Penn because it's their first and only choice," said Lee Stetson, Penn's dean of admissions.

Early-decision applicants make up nearly half of the freshman class and about 4,000 of the school's 22,000 applications.

At Princeton, which receives more than 17,000 applications for 1,225 freshman spots, officials aren't expecting the end of early decision to harm the quality of their classes. Last year, more than 8,000 candidates had a combined SAT score of 2,100 out of 2,400 and 5,000 had GPAs of 4.0.

"Even if 1,000 decided to go somewhere else, we're still going to have an incredible applicant pool," said Rapelye of Princeton.

The University of Delaware, which dropped early decision in May before Harvard made its announcement, fared well in the fall. The number and quality of applications are up, said Louis Hirsh, director of admissions.

"We've gotten lots of good feedback from guidance counselors across the country that seemed very appreciative."...

Some local colleges that will keep early decision say they did not see racial and economic discrepancies in early- and regular-decision students.

"When we did an analysis of both the socioeconomic diversity and racial and ethnic diversity, we found it to be almost even," said Jennifer Rikard, dean of admissions and financial aid at Bryn Mawr, a private women's college.

Though some acknowledge discrepancies, they said they worked hard to cultivate applications from minority students and low-income families so their numbers are fairly represented in the freshman class.

"We've never been more diverse. It's not hurting us," said Jim Bock, dean of admissions and financial aid at Swarthmore College.

Penn's Stetson said: "We're getting more students applying from lower-income levels and more students of color. Although that's a slow process, it's improving."

The freshman class had the highest minority representation in the school's history, at 41 percent - including 24 percent Asian, 9 percent black and African American, and 8 percent Hispanic, Stetson said. Though this year's crop of early-decision candidates showed a drop in black and Hispanic students, Stetson said the university expected to get more minority students through regular decision and again enroll a record number.

[/quote]

<a href="http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/local/16462003.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/local/16462003.htm</a>

asteriskea · February 22, 2007, 12:20pm

This thread seems to me to be an appropriate place for a link to this installment in NPR's series on how to navigate the oft stormy seas of college admissions, keep focused, and avoid the frenzy since according to some experts, with Harvard and Princeton out of the picture, IHE's such as Georgetown, the University of Chicago, Stanford et al stand to expect a boom in early applications come the fall of 2007:

"Seven Things You Need to Know About Early Action"

<a href="http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7082167%5B/url%5D">http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7082167</a>

edad · February 22, 2007, 2:18pm

I think some threads need an expiration date.

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