<p>The crudeness is exactly what bothers me. Very imprecise. Leads to loads of mail.
Maybe they do look at zip code, too.
But it still seems ridiculous that they send out so much, and that it is such expensive and official-looking stuff which so very personally addresses the kids. It feels a bit deceptive. JMO.</p>
<p>What do you think would happen if H or Y or P did decide to stop with the mass blanketing, and send more educational materials that more precisely target kids that fit their needs and criteria? Would application numbers go down? If so, what would happen to their acceptance rate? Their rankings? In relation to one another?!</p>
<p>Then, same q for schools like NU, Duke, WUSTl.</p>
<p>Just imagine this.</p>
<p>I really approve of what Elon is doing. They will see a rise in their yield, most likely. They have drawn the line, and it feels healthy and confident.</p>
<p>As to Georgetown, which still does not use the Common App, I have no factual idea why not. My sense is that it may be partly because they are still a Jesuit institution. Also that they are not very automated and have less money to play around with, frankly. I have no idea whether they do any marketing at all, either. Thoughts?</p>
<p>I doubt the Harvard adcoms personally stuff 70,000 envelopes too. There are plenty of mass-mailing firms they can hire to handle that. Companies of all types use them all the time. But a junk mail firm is not the same thing as an enrollment management company. And I doubt that the high-end colleges are going to be putting their admission fates in the hands of one of those outfits like menloparkmom linked to in post #72. They’ve got too much to lose an not much to gain by doing so. In most cases it has been their own in-house recruitment methods, refined over many years - before enrollment firms even existed, that got them to their current lofty heights. So it seems to me they will be unlikely to throw that over in favor of some slick consultants whose professional claim to fame is a track record of moving middle-ranked schools up a notch.</p>
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<p>No, not necessarily. It may just mean that they missed her when drawing up their list of kids to target. No marketing method is perfect.</p>
<p>Right - and the only way to move beyond targeting on the crude measures of PSAT plus demographics are to presuppose that the college has certain criteria that it wants to hit – in other words, that they know who they want to admit before they even see them. </p>
<p>Look, it’s type I vs type II error. The risk of missing the diamond-in-the-rough in rural West Virginia or Watts is far greater than the risk of upsetting a bunch of kids in Short Hills who thought that Harvard’s mailing meant that Harvard loved them with all its heart and now their disappointed parents can’t brag at the PTA meeting. There will be more kids from Short Hills – there may not be more in rural West Virginia.</p>
<p>And I’m sorry, I really do have to laugh at the “well, elite boarding schools don’t have to do this – they go by word of mouth.” Really? I wonder how well elite boarding schools are top of mind in rural West Virginia. Again, elite boarding schools can run their schools the way they like – but they aren’t going to get diversity by relying upon “word of mouth” passing from the Upper East Side to West Virginia.</p>
<p>I found absolutely nothing deceptive about any mailing whatsoever, and I’d like to see an example of a mailing that someone found “deceptive.” Here, come look at our school - you seem like just the kind of student we’d like – here are some pretty pictures of our dorms, halls, athletic facilities, and a bunch of us chilling on the lawn studying under trees. And here’s some fun stats about us - we have kids from every state, 30 countries, blah blah blah. I cannot find anything deceptive about that in the least. </p>
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<p>How, precisely, should they identify “kids that fit their needs and criteria”? What mailing list do you suggest that they go to – and based on what? Are you presupposing that they should only send to (say) kids with 2300+? Well, they don’t want a class of solely 2300+. Only to kids who live in well-to-do zip codes? Well, they don’t want a class solely from Winnetka and Greenwich. How are these kids supposed to be pre-identified, IYO?</p>
<p>The elite boarding schools have outreach reach programs (e.g., KIPP) to attract disadvantaged kids. The rich kids/families already know about them from legacy or word of mouth.</p>
<p>It is the middle class kids that the BS’s really struggle with. It’s a mystery to me how this group gets introduced to BS. I’m not aware of mass marketing to middle class kids.</p>
<p>No, not necessarily. It may just mean that they missed her when drawing up their list of kids to target. No marketing method is perfect. "</p>
<p>Why would you assume the school “doesn’t want her to apply”? If my neighbor gets a mailing from the local BMW dealer and I don’t, does that mean that the BMW dealer won’t welcome me showing up to take a test drive with my checkbook in hand? If my neighbor gets an LL Bean catalog and I don’t, does that mean that LL Bean won’t take my phone call when I order? It was a freakin’ mailing list. I really am amazed at the naivete here. Hasn’t anyone ever had a business and tried to promote it?</p>
<p>I cannot even begin to respond to someone with your intense desire to disagree. There already have been numerous examples of non word of mouth marketing, targeted to high performance kids around the country by elite BS. Guess you missed those posts.</p>
<p>And, btw, unless you have direct knowledge and experience, why do you have the right to pass along your opinions as the truth?</p>
<p>Anyway, pg, word of mouth does work in local situations off the grid of where you seem to think BS kids all come from. Once one kid from MT goes and loves it, their experience is known in the surrounding area. The BS starts to attract other MT applicants, and may even create a prospective event there. Happens all the time, as I am part of such an effort.</p>
<p>Look, all I was trying to do is say that it is interesting to make comparisons with the elite BS as they are somewhat analogous to the elite colleges, with important differences, but NOT the mythical and prejudiced ones you keep pointing to. I am not giving in to your bluster here. If you were really curious, you would be responding to all the posts here.</p>
<p>I concede only that I should never have brought it up here, with you on the thread.</p>
<p>I think that the basic discussion here is important. Apologies to the others for my distraction as it provoked reactions that I do need to correct. And I do stand corrected by some of you, as well.</p>
<p>Ferocity? Oh goodness, the drama over a mailing. It’s like people have never received any mail before. Hey, kid with good grades / scores - we’re a college who might want people like you and here’s a brochure about our school.</p>
<p>I think Harvard is pretty much doing what it needs to do to reach the kids it really wants, because what it wants are high-performing kids from all over the country, including kids of varying socioeconomic status, race, interests, etc. And it probably still misses some, because of kids who don’t take the PSAT, or who improve a lot after taking it, etc.
And it may be that a mass mailing based on PSAT is actually cheaper than a program that would narrow the group down. I assume that’s why I often receive slick ads for things that don’t interest me in the slightest.</p>
<p>I think there probably are a few kids who misunderstand what a mailing from Harvard means. After all, they come on CC and ask about it. I think we may have different views about how many such kids there are, though.</p>
<p>pg-You talk circles around your own arguments. If these mailings do NOT provoke a response, then why do them???
Earlier you said that OF COURSE these mailing were trying to stimulate more applications.</p>
<p>You know, you do know a lot about colleges and applications and all that, and I daresay you are “privileged” and “entitled” by that info.
What about the kids who have not been exposed to these schools? Whose parents have not? Who have never recd anything like this in that mail? Yes, it is nice to “inform” them, but aren’t they getting seduced and preyed upon a bit, too??? Are you saying they are STUPID?</p>
<p>You arrogant presumption that anyone who takes these things in a way other than you, the sophisticated one, does, is really condescending. You are right, you are smart, and anyone who you disagrees with you, you fight to the death. </p>
<p>Stop playing the class warfare card in your ad hominems, as well. You have NO idea what posters’ circumstances really are. It is unkind.</p>
<p>I found absolutely nothing deceptive about any mailing whatsoever</p>
<p>But still, there are a lot of first generation students out there & when mailings are personalized towards their child, those parents may be just naive enough to assume that their child really is as " special" as they think they are. Even if they aren’t first gen- some families aren’t very worldly or suspicious & take things at face value or yes, read more into it.</p>
<p>I’m not saying businesses can’t do what they feel is needed within legal parameters to sustain their business- not at all. But at my daughters inner city school ( & I expect at most schools) which send kids every year to Ivies and comparable, the counselors are stretched too thin to help parents navigate through the mountains of mailings.</p>
<p>I don’t know if my D would have been accepted to any of those Ivy schools, she didn’t apply because she didn’t want to go to the east coast ( likes heat not cold), but considering her conservative scores, ( although the rest of her application would have stood out), we were a bit befuddled at the amount of mail she recieved.</p>
<p>I agree with that. But what about sending a free “priority application” to a kid that has no chance of being accepted? I don’t know if it’s deceptive, but it seems a little unkind. I know my kid isn’t getting into Fordham, and he says he knows it, but some part of him must be thinking he has a chance, since he took the initiative and the time to fill out their application when he could have been playing Xbox.</p>
<p>GMT - “the masses” don’t look at USNWR. The vast majority of Hs seniors decide on colleges based on cost and proximity to home and availability of a specific major / interest area. The USNWR phenomenon is coastal and upper middle class.</p>
<p>But wait–I have a factual question: who, exactly, is Harvard sending letters to? Is it sending letters to kids who had PSAT scores of 180? How many kids, really, who have no hope of getting in are getting these letters? Sure, if the letter is based on scores, Harvard doesn’t know what your GPA is–but what, exactly, is the score range Harvard is mailing to? If you learned (for example) that Harvard was sending a letter to any non-URM who got an SAT of 2200 or higher, and any URM with 2000 or higher, would you think that was bad? We hear anecdotes of kids who got the letters even though they had no chance, but we also hear anecdotes of kids who didn’t realize they might have the option of a school like that until they got the letter. Which is more common?</p>
<p>Overall, let’s remember we’re talking college here. The fact that a kid thinks a school mailing means they realllly want him doesn’t mean he’s stupid. BUT, it doesn’t mean he can skip some critical thinking, some research into those schools to see if he is a reasonable candidate. Ignorance may be an excuse in some cases- but to really qualify for a Harvard or Chi or whatever, the kid, the actual kid, should have some sense or he’d never succeed there.</p>
<p>Let’s also reconsider some of the fussing at each other here.</p>
<p>There are marketing stats that help clients decide what investment is worth what returns. Certainly, a H or Chi doesn’t go into this blind. Oh let’s send out 20,000. Oh, let’s send out 70,000. They have to get the right “something” back on that, whether it’s branding or the diamonds who otherwise wouldn’t know enough about the school. In fact, the original article mentioned Chi wanting to put forth an alternate image. In fact, many schools in snow belts send out sweet brochures and dvds showing all the happy activities in winter, etc.</p>
<p>it is the director of admissions job to get as many applications as possible so that they can reject them and please their students and alumni as being the most selective.</p>
<p>Far more complex than that. Not the way I see it. It’s the dir’s job to build a succesful freshman class that will enhance the college- in numerous ways. And, survive whatever the challenges are at that school. And, go on to reasonably successful lives (however defined) AND give money back. And then some. Things like filling seats in the new lab, keeping the French Lit program lively, having kids for the orchestra, intramural sports, the causes, etc. And, yield.</p>
<p>One purpose behind all the adcom travel is to know communities and high schools- to meet GCs and learn about special kids. It’s not as simple as zip code or scores.</p>
<p>“One purpose behind all the adcom travel is to know communities and high schools- to meet GCs and learn about special kids. It’s not as simple as zip code or scores.”</p>
<p>How does that work? Are there many schools and kids not on the radar screens, not getting visits or invited to presentations??? How many areas can really be covered by these trips???
Are these trips missing a lot of great kids? Or are they not politically correct, in that they are not available to as many kids as they should be??
What returns are there on the visits?
How are kids invited to presentations?</p>
<p>John F Kennedy Jr attended Brown, despite less than stellar stats, with direct application-time intervention by his mom. (It also took several tries for him to pass the Bar exam, as I recall.) He was American “royalty”, with a higher celebrity/prestige profile than Emma Watson. Imagine if middle-class mid-range student John F Smith Jr with same stats presumed to apply to Brown, or Northwestern, or Grinnell. </p>
<p>I recall several “higher ed administration” blogs have directly addressed ethics of this marketing trend of extensive mailings to a broad range of students beyond target profile to increase application counts so as to be able to decrease acceptance rates. I suspect these schools are buying student lists in bulk from various list assemblers, including College Board and ACT, just like Princeton Review and the other test-preparers. And yes, I think a fair nuimber of students (and their parents) receiving those mailers think that they have an acceptance chance. Why else would there be a mailer touting the school arriving each week? Not everyone reads CC. Not everyone is even reading Princeton Review, Barrons, “how-to” college application manuals, or even material available at the HS college counseling office. I know plenty of upper-middle-class parents who aren’t actively engaged in this level of detailed analysis during college selection process, and would be perfectly content if their kid went to a state university and super-pleased if the kid was admitted to our flagging flagship.</p>
<p>FWIW, the elite boarding schools do a fair amount of recruiting, at least based on what’s been in my mailbox. It’s fairly clear that they get their lists from Talent search and AMC-10 middle school participants. (The letters say so.)</p>
<p>I would also note that most of the letters I’ve seen aren’t actually misleading if you read what they say. They say, essentially, hey, you got a good score on the PSAT and that suggests you might be a candidate for Princeton. That’s true, as far as it goes, as long as the PSAT cutoff for the mailing is sensible.</p>
<p>The really misleading mailings are the ones for books and trips that are supposed to be “honors.” The continuing success of those suggests that some people can be misled by these kinds of mailings, I suppose.</p>