Do colleges let high schools know of acceptance/rejection?

Parents Forum
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<p>My son was approached by a teacher at the high school who congratulated him on his ED acceptance. My son hadn’t told anyone about it, so he asked the teacher how he knew and the teacher said there was a list in the counseling office of students’ acceptances. I dunno how that list came to be. In fact, since my son applied as a homeschooler (he took a few classes at the high school, and submitted that partial transcript along with his other application materials), the counseling office was not involved in his application at all – I filled out the Secondary School Report, as homeschoolers are expected to do. I have no idea how the high school found out, but the college must have notified them in some way.</p>

<p>The high school paper also published a map of where students were going to college at the end of the year, and they had all that information even though it was not provided by the students – or at least not all of them.</p>

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<p>I know that some colleges will send the high school counselor a list of every kid who applied and the result of the application. The one that I’ve seen at the high school is Dartmouth.</p>

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<p>Every kid who applied to a number of colleges made their teachers and guidance counselors jump through a lot of hoops, what with school reports, transcripts, letters of rec, and meetings. I think it is only polite to let those teachers and guidance counselors know the results from their labors–the good and the bad news. Letting a counselor know when you DIDN’T get in sometimes gives them as much information that they can use for future students as the news of where you did get in.</p>

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<p>Just wanted to provide an anecdote- my school, like many others mentioned, publishes a map of where students are attending in the fall (in the school newspaper, uncertain if it’s “official”). However, this map does not always show publicly known information about a student’s destination, let alone private information. One glaring error was when a student was mentioned at the school awards ceremony a couple times that they will attend a certain prestigious art school, yet this was not published in the map.</p>

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<p>My son’s Catholic school wanted to know where he got in and how much money. His GC kept track of it to see trends, etc. and they always gave a number at the graduation ceremony, for example"our grads got into 200 colleges and had 500,000 total in aid…lame lumped together, but it sounded nice.
They also gave a list to the grads of all the students and where they would be for “keep in touch” purposes, it wasn’t printed anywhere else I could remember.
The GC liked to know where they got accepted, because although there might be 50 students going to UConn, many of them got into Villanova or BC, etc. but couldn’t afford it. Where a student goes, isn’t indicitive of where he/she got in.</p>

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<p>Our college counselors usually know where our kids are accepted before we do. They have a conference call with adcoms from each school a few weeks before the decision day. At year end, the final edtion of school’s paper publishes where each kid is going.</p>

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<p>Well, maybe your kids’ GCs were doing something above and beyond their job description to help your kids out, but my kid’s did what is expected of her as a GC (and did it very well, too, which she knows we appreciated), so the “hoops” are part of her job. Kids have a right to keep their college information private. I know schools like to know of all acceptances, rejections, scholarships, etc., just like doctors’ offices like to have patients’ Social Security numbers. Many schools also like to know a kid’s SAT/ACT scores to add to their transcripts. Doesn’t mean they are entitled to the information, however.</p>

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<p>It’s up to the students to tell the GC’s of college decisions - good, bad or ugly. I don’t think anyone minds doing this because the school’s scattergrams are so helpful and it’s nice to pay it forward. Also, the school does publish the list of where all graduates are going (even if they are taking a PG year). For those that defer, the school where they are going is still listed as where they are going.</p>

<p>Also, the school’s profile lists all colleges for the past five years and the numbers attending.</p>

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<p>It depends upon the high school, specifically the college counselor there as to how they know who gets in where. All of the data is not accurate, because mistakes are made and there are folks who give incorrect information. </p>

<p>In some situations where the high school counselor knows the admissions officers of some colleges, they may have inside information as to the status of their applicants. I know that my oldest son’s gc knew about some of his acceptances before he told them. They were from schools where there were some connections. </p>

<p>Some high school request the original acceptance letters, most just take the word of the students. Not everyone complies with the request for info. I know my second son was very incomplete in giving out his information.</p>

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<p>Our HS does not use Naviance, and they do not keep track of acceptances / denies. They do ask for notification of ALL scholarships that they kids are offered (even the ones they don’t accept). </p>

<p>They keep track of the ultimate college destinations from where the students ask to have the final transcript sent. The student newspaper also interviews kids about their chosen college, and they get to wear logo shirts on “college day”, but those activities are strictly voluntary.</p>

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<p>Our HS does find out and posts the results yearly, but not by name. For example: </p>

<p>Yale University: 11 applied, 4 admitted, 2 attending, 7 wait listed, wait list accept 4 (number accepted off wait list not listed)</p>

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<p>DD HS ask students to update Naviance with the information. The school newspaper print self reporting of the seniors to the matriculant college.
But the school does report officially the number of acceptances and matriculation of each batch, so they must have the information to officially provide it.
Also there is a website that tracks number of matriculant to the top schools from top private/public high schools which indicates the information can be obtained on an independent basis from the colleges itself.</p>

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<p>I got an email from D’s IB high school earlier this fall, telling us where the graduates ended up attending – not the same as admit/deny, but interesting nonetheless. Names weren’t given, just tallies. </p>

<p>The graduates are also invited to attend a breakfast at the high school on the last day of school before winter break. They will get their diplomas/certificates (“This will mark the conclusion of your IB education.”), followed by a forum where they talk to this year’s seniors about their college experience thus far. They were told to wear a college sweatshirt, so it should be a colorful morning.</p>

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<p>A copy of my acceptance letter was mailed to my HS’ counseling office which was further forwarded to me in class! I think I got about three or four notifications that I was accepted to that University! haha. One to my parents, counselors, myself, and a phone call.</p>

<p>I have no objections to it, but I feel like it’s just more mail for busy counselors. Do they really care? Maybe they’ll care about where we decide to go, but beyond that, I don’t quite understand it.</p>

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<p>I have a good relationship with the GC at my daughter’s high school, and even though my daughter is long gone I still do some volunteer work there and chat with the GC. If I hear of a kid getting accepted to a school, I tell her – and she is very appreciative of getting the information. She takes a sincere interest in the kids she works with, and wants to know what happened. </p>

<p>I think most kids don’t realize that colleges don’t tell the GC of the results – they assume the colleges inform the high schools so they don’t need to.</p>

<p>I respect your opinion, owlice, but I don’t understand it. High schools are involved in almost every step of the application process, except the very last part. I think colleges have a responsibility to inform them about the results.</p>

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<p>I agree with owlice, that the results are none of the high school’s business, especially if the information is going to be published in some way (even anonymously), but even if it is not. </p>

<p>We did not use our (public school) GCs for the application process at all, because it became clear to us early on (by 10th grade), that our GCs were not giving accurate or informed advice. Yes, the GCs did the recs, but that is only because the colleges required them; if my Ds had had the choice, they would have asked someone else to provide that rec. As owlice said, it is part of the GC’s job to do these recs. They are being paid to fill them out.</p>

<p>Private school families may feel differently about this; I don’t feel any obligation to give government employees any information about my family that is not required by law.</p>

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<p>A resource that my kids’ HS provided was a 10 or so page list of the form:</p>

<p>Wt GPA, major, SAT scores, accepted schools, rejected schools</p>

<p>We think it’s a subset of students in the past couple of years, and I don’t who was selected to be in the list or how they categorized the wait listed. Since there are generally not too many kids who apply to HYPSM (or some obscure school), it’s probably possible to guess the candidates and hence figure out their GPA, SATs, etc., but based on what my older two said, nobody really cared, and people were happy that this resource was available. They actually reported their accepts and rejects to their GC, so it’s possible the school wasn’t informed by the colleges.</p>

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<p>I see owlice (and Bay’s) point very clearly. Our high school announced where each kid was going at graduation (less than 90 public school graduates.) I think that’s in bad taste. Some kids were going to CC or right into the work force, and although their plans got nominal respect, since people were also going off to Princeton and Cornell it seems uncomfortable for some families.</p>

<p>And I know the kids worried about it though out the entire college acceptance season. Silly, but understandable.</p>

<p>On the other hand there is a transaction and process between the Guidance Department of the HS and the Admissions Department of the college, and I can see that it would seem to be a courtesy to have the Admissions Department inform the HS.</p>

<p>The fairest procedure would seem to be to have kids check off a box indicating that this was okay. No check, no information. That would be simple and clean.</p>

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<p>Not silly at all, IMO. My D went to an IB magnet school that was also a neighborhood school. On the commencement program, the IBers had all kinds of symbols next to their names denoting Diploma/Certificate, 4.0, NMF, etc. The neighborhood kids’ names looked so bare in comparison. I felt bad for them.</p>

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<p>No, high schools are not involved in almost every step of the application process. The high school itself has to 1.) send in school info; 2.) send in transcripts. Neither of these takes place without the permission of the student, and both of these are part of a GC’s job. A student can ask teachers for recommendations; so far as I know, this is not tracked by the high school, at least at my son’s school. Teachers can refuse to write recommendations for a student.</p>

<p>Students are responsible for determining where to apply, filling out the applications, getting needed standardized test scores sent, writing their essays, handling the deadlines for all the different parts of the app, including financial aid info, asking teachers and others for recommendations, filing whatever paperwork is necessary with the school to make sure the school info and transcripts are sent, following up on any and all pieces to make sure everything that needs to be in is in.</p>

<p>Colleges should not be revealing a student’s information – including acceptance/waitlist/denial – without permission from the student to release this information. Perhaps some colleges have arrangements with some high schools to release such information, but if they do, I certainly hope that a release from the student to share this information is part of the application package. </p>

<p>Just as my son’s SAT scores are NOT the high school’s business, so it is with his admissions results. </p>

<p>(Of course, for him, this is a mostly moot point, as he applied to only one college, and the GC and the teachers who wrote him recs knew he was going to attend it because he told them so. The school itself, however, called me when first quarter grades came out this year to find out where he was, as none of his teachers had seen him so far this school year. :D)</p>

<p>My objection to revealing such information is because I believe kids deserve privacy; they can certainly share the information if they choose, but it should be their choice. On top of that, I’ve found that 1.) school records are frequently wrong; 2.) it can take an act of God, Congress, or the court to fix school records; 3.) even then, the records may not be corrected.</p>

<p>Of course, your kid’s school/experience may be different, but I would be loathe to provide any more information to the school system, any school system, than is absolutely required.</p>