<p>The Atlantic Monthly's annual college issue (the November issue) is now out to subscribers. There is one article in particular that everyone should read - it's called "The Best Class Money Should Buy." The article is about how 3/4 of colleges are now using sophisticated enrollment management tools and strategies that determine everything from who gets targeted for marketing materials, to which students get accepted, to how financial aid and merit money is doled out. </p>
<p>"The 'gatekeeper' model of admissions has been dead for some time," asserts the article. In it's place: managing enrollment to keep revenues high and build ratings. While we all knew the latter, it's the first one that I think is most important to understand: managing enrollment to keep revenues high.</p>
<p>The well-researched article notes that at many schools, it's not enough to be a high scoring student. You have to be a high-scoring student who can afford to pay. One example from the article: A school can decide to give a $20,000 full tuition need-based financial aid grant to a low income student. Or, the school can break that down into 4 $5,000 merit scholarships for "welathier students who would probably go elsewhere without the discounts but will pay the outstanding tuition if they can be lured to your school." Net result for the school: an extra $240,000 in revenues over the next four years, which "can be used to buy more rich students - or gifted students who will improve the school's profile and thus its desirability and revenue."</p>
<p>Low income kids may be accepted, but many schools practice "admit deny" - offer admission but give them a fraction of what they would need to attend, even after the maximum possible contribution from their families.
"Admit deny is when you give someone a financial aid package that is so rotten that you hope they get the message: don't come," says one enrollment management consultant in the article. "Unfortunately, they don't always get the message." </p>
<p>Some other interesting highlights: most colleges and universities now know exactly how much your family income is likely to be before you even apply. The College Board and ACT, as well as other consulting firms, are selling lists of students that combine demographic data and other information with test scores so that schools know with some amount of accuracy which "prospects" are not only likely to succeed if they're admitted (remember grad. rates are a chunk of the USNews rankings) but likely to be able to pay all or at least a good chunk of the cost of attending. </p>
<p>"The ACT and the College Board don't just sell hundreds of thousands of student profiles to schools; they also offer software and consulting services that can be sued to set crude wealth and test-score cutoffs, to target or elimminate students before they apply...[Says one consultant in the article] "It's a blunt object, a pre-sorting mechanism and it's a great labor-saving device. What a convenience! I can look and say you're an 1150, you're going to be all right - instead of having to pore over this thing and wring my hands and justify taking a chance becasue this kid's got an average of X but I'm seeing things that make the case as an individual. That takes work. The real opportunity costs are not the billions we're thowing out in marketing. It's the opportunity cost of looking past literally millions of kids who would do a great job."</p>
<p>In short, merit money isn't just being used to buy higher test scores, it's also being used to make sure the school can manage it's budget. At many schools, the latter is the primary goal.</p>
<p>One other fascinating tidbit: merit money and good financial aid packages (i.e., those with more grants than loans) are LEAST likely to go to students that the school has identified as MOST likely to attend. In other words, demonstrated interest may be a double-edged sword. It may get you in, but if you need money showing too much demonstrated interest may hinder your chances of getting it. (One thing that caught my eye in particular: the suggestion that the College Board and ACT actually tell schools whether you listed them first or farther down the list when you order your test scores sent - according to the article, that's used by many schools as one measure of being likely to attend.)</p>
<p>And, this quote is for Mini: "That students are rejected on the basis of income is one of the most closely held secrets in admissions; enrollment managers say the practice is far more prevalent than most schools let on. 'Good luck getting any institution to tell you exactly how the handle the ability to pay as a driver in their admit decision,' said one enrollment manager who requiested anonymity. 'What they will say is "We're need blind." That's bull*****. They would never tell you exactly how they do it, but they do it all the time."</p>
<p>Finally, don't think that enrollment management is only being used by private schools. Public institutions are using it as well. The article quotes enrollment managers from the U of Wisconsin, Ohio State, and the University of Alabama. Here's one quote from the article, from the enrollment manager at the University of Alabama:</p>
<p>"At the AACRAO [the professional organization for enrollment managers] confersnce two members of the University of Alabama's enrollment management team deomonstrated how, in their campaign for out-of-state prospects, the overlaid income data from the U.S. Census on maps of high schools in Texas to target wealthy students. (Alabama's data mining strategies are inspired by the success of the credit-card company Capital One) After the presentation I sat down with Roger Thompson (Alabama's enrollment management director) and asked him how he approached recruiting at rich private secondary schools.</p>
<p>"'Oh, if you're in enrollment management, those schools are fantastic!," he said. "There are some kids there that we'll buy. The National Merit kids, they're going to get a full ride. But if you're dsitting at a private high school in Florida, where they pay twenty grand to go, we don't even bring financial-aid material. What's the point? You don't even need to talk about cost."</p>
<p>Finally, schools acknowledged as having ambitious and aggressive enrollemnt mangaement strategies: USC, Carnegie Mellon, Tulane, WUSTL, NYU, Syracuse, Boston College, and Boston University. But, note, not all of them are buying numbers, many are buying revenue streams.</p>