<p>It’s obvious that colleges have to keep a close eye on the ratio of full-pay to scholarship students. They need to meet budget. I had also assumed that given a choice between good student A who can pay full freight, and equally good student B who needs FA, student A would get the spot. I shouldn’t have been surprised that they are taking kids who can pay even if they have lower grades and scores, but I was.</p>
<p>Wow, thanks for this. </p>
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<p>Who knew colleges were paying agents on commission to recruit foreign students?? Not me!</p>
<p>Yeah, Gwen, but the policy hasn’t been passed yet. I predict a lot of push-back on that one.</p>
<p>Bottom line is that it’s a fine line that University admissions folks walk these days. They definitely need more pay per student, regardless of endowments. But–P.C. or not–students & their parents have little tolerance for a high percentage of foreign students at their school. I have heard multiple remarks in that vein about our state flagship (UIUC), in which extremely high-ranking in-state students are being deferred, then denied, with (ostensibly) those spots going to full-pay international students.</p>
<p>That correlation in itself may be somewhat of a stretch, but it is no doubt a trend at UIUC.</p>
<p>It’s been reported on with some regularity. There was an article in the Times about this in the SUNY system maybe a couple of years ago? I don’t know whether it happens outside of China, but apparently it’s a whole system there. And lots of non-top-ranked colleges in the Northeast and Midwest, where populations are declining, understand that they are not going to survive unless they attract substantial numbers of additional students from somewhere, and it’s easier to do it in China than in Florida or California.</p>
<p>Wow, rather illuminating article.</p>
<p>Some of this doesn’t really make sense. How can this phenomenon be reconciled with the mantra pushed by some that scores (and grades) are so highly correlated with family income? One would think that there would be an ample pile of competent applicants without compromising academic quality. </p>
<p>On the other hand, this is the obvious, inevitable result of charging heavily “progressive” tuition. Full pay students are a lot more valuable to your budget than others. It must be nice to be able to sell the same product to people for prices that reflect the ability to pay. Most enterprises actually have to provide something extra for the incremental price. So far, not universities.</p>
<p>it is interesting, too, that only 1% of those admitted with lower scores are women, even where there is a 40-odd percent admissions for minorities with lower scores. Just fyi</p>
<p>Also interesting is that only 1% say they penalize Asian applicants for being Asian. Of course, some people may not give that full credibility …</p>
<p>Also,</p>
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<p>I’m sure that nobody on CC would ever resort to such tactics.</p>
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<p>Why not? I don’t see why anyone wouldn’t give it full credibility. There are more qualified women than men in the college game by a significant amount. I don’t even want to think how challenging it would be to be an asian girl-- full pay or not.</p>
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<p>Because some people aren’t interested in data that contradicts their most precious assumptions.</p>
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<p>Not too surprised. A mix of a poorly performing US economy, rapid growth of the upper/upper-middle classes in China who’d have no problems being full-pay/sacrificing heavily* to do so, more Chinese parents becoming disillusioned over the cutthroat competition of the national college exam(In 2007, less than half of all exam takers(~49%) were accepted to any college…much less an elite one), same Chinese parents concerned about the educational quality/relevance of the Chinese university system, perceptions among many Profs/admins that internationals tend to be stronger students with far greater work ethic than US students on average**, etc. </p>
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<li>International students/parents actually end up paying more due to being charged more types of fees/expenses than their US counterparts.<br></li>
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<p>** Obscured by the fact that until recently, a large part of this was because at many US universities/colleges international students were held to higher admissions standards than their US counterparts. However, from what I understand from some Profs…that may no longer be the case.</p>
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<p>Well, I am surprised at this as well, since there’s fairly good evidence (rather than just a ‘mantra pushed by some’) that test scores do correlate with family income:</p>
<p>[SAT</a> Scores and Family Income - NYTimes.com](<a href=“http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/08/27/sat-scores-and-family-income/]SAT”>SAT Scores and Family Income - The New York Times)</p>
<p>[SAT</a> scores show disparities by race, gender, family income - USATODAY.com](<a href=“http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2009-08-25-SAT-scores_N.htm]SAT”>http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2009-08-25-SAT-scores_N.htm)</p>
<p>“The highest average score of all (1702, up 26 points) was posted by students who said their families earned more than $200,000 a year.”</p>
<p>I think the income question goes back to defining the middle class. Most families, right or wrong, that make right around 200,000/ year of FAMILY income are living up to their means. So there is not the money to pay $250,000+ in cash for college.</p>
<p>We visited a LAC where a professor who is a family friend made no bones about the fact that because they wanted to keep their current students’ FA whole (especially because some parents had lost jobs, etc) that they were advantaging full-pays for the next few years.</p>
<p>Yes, test scores and grades correlate with family income - but I think the point being made was that the full-pays get an extra boost, over and above the fact that they are likely to have higher grades and scores.</p>
<p>Many elite schools are need blind. Admission staff generally have little or no interest in families ability to pay the COA. The wealthiest campuses offer FA to 50% to 60% of their students. The average discount is 60% to 70% of the COA. For a student from California from a middle income household (70k- 80k) it can cost less to attend an ivy than a UC.</p>
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<p>Yes, but that represents a very, very small slice of the total college applicant pool.</p>
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<p>The funds paid by wealthier students subsidize low-income students. The mantra here on CC has been that this is not true - that even full-pay students are being subsidized (mini) and that the money for low-income students comes from a different “bucket” of funds. If those theories were ever true, apparently they no longer are true.</p>