Funny, I had heard of and Oberlin and Grinnell, but not Carleton. But then neither of my kids was looking at midwestern LACs.
Elite Admissions:Rejection feels less like turning down a first date than getting left at the altar.
I can remember being at holiday parties in the NE, when ED/EA decisions came out, and parents were bragging about Oberlin acceptances and everyone was very impressed. I always thought it was top tier.
I remember being very surprised when my kids were applying and looking at the USNews lists for the first time, because some colleges I was positive were tippy-top based on local reputation were not that high up in the list, so it didn’t seem to me a very good list. It went against the accepted wisdom. And I was living in an ivy world.
We’re dissecting Oberlin’s rep? OHMom’s comment is very telling: “a lot of people aren’t familiar with LACs at all - Williams, Amherst, Swat, Haverford, etc.” Their loss.
I am familiar with scores of LACs and know Oberlin. I just didn’t know it was widely considered a “top tier” college - so granted that one would make a comment like “In what world is it not considered top tier”. That’s all. Some of you explained to me patiently why it was a good college without being judgemental about my ignorance. Thank you.
http://qz.com/498534/these-25-schools-are-responsible-for-the-greatest-advances-in-science/
Oberlin is listed at no. 11 on the second list.
PARENTS, please get the word out to all the applicants coming up the high school-pipeline now: elite colleges do not care about crushing the hopes of thousands of applicants. They care about the almighty YIELD and the multi-millions of dollars made ANNUALLY from application fees. (Harvard has approx. 39,044 applicants times $75 fee = $2,928,300 in collected fees. Multiply that by approx. 13 elite colleges, for instance, and you get approx. $38,000,000 in ANNUAL fees collected from working parents. Hell, that’s movie-star money).
I don’t blame colleges for wanting academic superstars; I BLAME colleges for using marketing to keep hope high, keep fees rolling in, and keep applications pouring in, all in an effort to lower Admission Rates and keep their rank high. Here is what they tell you: “We view applications holistically – everyone has a chance.” Here is what really happens: “Recruit to deny! Recruit to deny! Recruit to deny because YIELD is king!”
HIGH SCHOOL KIDS - hear me please, and explain this to ALL your friends:
Here is how college admissions at every single Ivy league college and all "soft-Ivy" league colleges REALLY works: There is Hurdle #1 and you must get through it; if you don't, you are literally out of the game right then and there. Period. Do not doubt this because the only one getting crushed is YOU. Do not think YOU are the exception. I promise you, you are not. Sorry, nothing personal because I don't know you at all. But I've been through the process and it is as ugly as a slaughter house. Hurdle #1 is Class Rank and Rigor of classes. EXAMPLES: If you have a 3.8 GPA in all AP classes, do not waste your hope and your parents' money because your application will definitely fail Hurdle #1. Your class rank is simply not high enough. If you have a 4.2 GPA taking classes lower than IB/AP/Honors, do not waste your parent's money, do not crush your own hope - - you have NO business applying to Ivy or soft Ivy because your class rigor is not high enough. Period. No EC's or recommendations will save you -- YOU WILL BE *D*E*N*I*E*D*. There are many, many thousands of kids who scored much better than you and they will be picked and you will get the boot.
You are so much better off knowing this fact NOW, rather than working like a dog for months on applications that will fail up front. It hurts for sure, but it does not crush your soul like slaving away until 2am on essays for 6 months and then getting DENIED. Scenario #1 is like having a bandage ripped off suddenly; scenario #2 is like having your leg ripped off.
The next hurdle is standardized tests; that’s Hurdle #2. Fail to score very high and you’re DENIED then and there. Admissions officers won’t really “read” your rec’s, won’t notice your socio-economic background, won’t waste 10 seconds caring about your community service work. Do not put up real, hard-earned dollars on a Vegas-style gamble because at least in Vegas you have a chance. Fail Hurdle #2 and you really and truly have zero chance; your application is already in the virtual trash can. (But your fee is in their pocket. Cha-ching!)
THERE IS ONE EXCEPTION to hurdle 1 &2, it’s not socio-economic background, it’s athletics! Super-star athletes have a chance even with lower class rank and lower std. test scores. (I know a kid who got in to Stanford THIS YEAR to play football for them – I sure hope he’s planning to major in Pottery otherwise he’s going to fail out).
As for the kids who do have top class rank in ultra-rigorous classes and top std. test scores, then and only then do you get moved to the next hurdle, Hurdle #3, where admissions counselors mull over things like EC’s, or legacy, and your socio-economic background. Eternal debates on these topics are all over the web – I’m not addressing any of those topics here.
My ONE mission is to get all the thousands of wonderful kids WITHOUT top rank to STOP applying to Ivies and soft Ivies because you are only fueling the madness, forcing the ever-tightening spiral upwards, and flushing millions of dollars earned by hard-working, loving parents right down the toilet drain – a toilet drain that apparently leads to the happy pockets of Ivie’s and soft-Ivies.
Bitter much?
As someone who just went through this process, I learned two things.
- It is not random. Everyone at my school knew who was going to get into the Ivies or Ivy caliber colleges. It was obvious who had the "it" factors. Also, there's a major difference between being obsessed with going to an Ivy (a lot of my school) and actually DOING what it takes to get into one over 3-4 years (tiny % of my school).
- Nobody that applied to Ivies ends up a drifting bum on their mom's couch. At worst the Ivy rejects are going to the honors college of our flagship U (30% acceptance rate), where they'll likely still become lawyers, doctors, silicon valley geeks.
Acceptance rate at Oberlin, 33%, is stronger than it appears. 1.) Not a name brand college, so it doesn’t have tens of thousands of kids applying for bragging rights. 2.) No heavy marketing to drum up deluge of unqualified apps. 3.) App essays are challenging.
@BusyMomofSons, you don’t have any idea of how the admissions process works. You’re simply making stuff up to vent off steam.
Too many delusional applicants assuming their application is an engagement. But all along it was just online dating on Tinder-- everyone thinking they’re hot stuff posing with a tiger.
I started this thread because I am concerned that too many students (on CC at least) generate fictional relationships with institutions and take it personally when they aren’t among the chosen. @BusyMomofSons seems to be taking the process personally as well. I’m finishing up with kid 2 and I can sympathize, but recommend against it.
I’m startled by the idea that Oberlin is not a name brand college. It certainly seems like one to me. I have never lived anywhere near Ohio, and I’ve always known about it.
@Marian, I feel the same way. I’ve always known about Oberlin since I was in high school. I don’t know why. OTOH, I never knew about Wesleyan until I read The Gatekeepers. I had heard of Swarthmore because I grew up about 20 minutes away but I didn’t realize it was such an elite LAC. In fact, I thought Oberlin was a better school (this is back in the 70s, so maybe reputations wax and wane).
I also had never heard of Carleton or Macalester until recently. and even now, my knowledge is limited to: upper midwest, very well-respected LACs. That’s it.
“started this thread because I am concerned that too many students (on CC at least) generate fictional relationships with institutions and take it personally when they aren’t among the chosen.”
Nicely said.
@futureNU16 I find it hard to believe that Oberlin doesn’t spend heavily on marketing. In our little world it is the joke of my D’s friends because they send so many mailings and emails-- more Oberlin things arriving in our home than from any other school. There is the impression that they are trying to increase their applications to increase their rankings. The girls are constantly snapping with photos of them with their latest Oberlin mailing/postcard and sending it off to each other on snap chat. One friend has starting collecting them all (from the entire group) and they have been planning some type of “craft” and the pile is enormous-- not sure if they visited a table at the HS college fair (they don’t seem to remember if they did), if it is geographic targeting, if it is test score targeting, or if it is completely random.
The parents were all together last week for spring formal photos and we were wondering if any of the kids would end up applying as a result of all of the attention the school is getting from this group.
I have always found it interesting in general that when a Northeast school expands marketing, it is viewed as the natural extension of knowledge to the unwashed masses, but when a school elsewhere does so, they are just trying to jack up applicants. That known-primarily-in- the-northeast=exclusive niche, but known- primarily-elsewhere=regional school. Just an observation!!
^^Nah, we felt Columbia was as bad as UChicago in mass mailings. The two schools were definitely the worst offenders in our house.
I completely agree!
@patsmom – Bitter? No, sorry it struck you that way. I’m very PASSIONATE about helping to control underaged kids’ expectations. Why? Because colleges have multi-million dollar budgets and a team of highly-trained professionals laser-focused on getting applications up and acceptance rates down. What do the kids have? Their dreams and a lot of stress. There needs to be a BALANCE to this equation.
I humbly suggest you look over Frank Bruni’s insightful article (link below) in the hopes you will see that kids (and their parents) are pushing too hard for Ivies (especially when acceptance is minuscule).
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/12/opinion/sunday/frank-bruni-best-brightest-and-saddest.html?_r=0
It highlights a story in one part of the country about a cluster of high-schoolers’ suicides due to stress: “Children [in Palto Alto] … grow up in the shadow of Stanford University, which established a new precedent for exclusivity during the recent admissions season, accepting just 5 percent of its applicants.” And "…a junior … recently wrote: ‘As I sit in my room staring at the list of colleges I’ve resolved to try to get into, trying to determine my odds of getting into each, I can’t help but feel desolate.’ She confessed to panic attacks in class, to menstrual periods missed as a result of exhaustion. ‘We are not teenagers,…We are lifeless bodies in a system that breeds competition, hatred…’ "
Lifeless bodies? Geesh, what’s she going to do when she doesn’t get in? What if, instead, all those high-achieving teens decided, en masse, to skip Ivies and apply to other excellent colleges around the country? They’d be super-stars on campus, lead healthier lives, and be no less successful in the long run.
My one and only point is a massive wave of teens, every year, gets swept up into the Ivy and soft-Ivy application frenzy only to be dashed on the rocks of reality. Thousands never should have applied in the first place. While the stress and disappointment damages their health, the app fees add up to a big win for the colleges.
Bitter? No, just passionate about the fact that Ivies’ greed for app fees and the almighty Low Acceptance Rate is, in fact, crushing teens’ mental and physical health. Over and over again. Year after year.
There is very little in blogs about keeping expectations in check. I guess there are more parents on blogs whose kids are currently going through the process (when everyone is still full of hope and optimism) and few parents who come back to blogs after it’s over to share the story of their amazing kid who is now crushed and depressed at all the Ivy or soft-Ivy rejections.