Having watched our D22 go through a number of the high level scholarship sections processes (UVA Jefferson, etc.), I think the holistic review is probably more relevant than ever, at least for the top end schools/scholarships. Most of the kids have great grades/test scores, but not all. There are many i have spoken to who are more likely to talk about projects they have done that have an impact to others than anything academically they’ve done. (Of course, some have ideas for PhD theses already…)
Our child has done very well academically, yet isn’t one of the students with dozens of AP courses, primary research, etc. Instead, she is incredibly driven and a talented leader, and that comes through (we think) in her essays and what we’ve been told was in her recommendations. That has given her the opportunity to at least tell her story to these incredible schools, and many liked her story enough for admission and scholarship offers.
Personally, it’s been enlightening as we prepare to guide our younger kids. Schools talk about wanting to see authenticity, and that radiates if the kid is really into things instead of just trying to complete some perceived college admission checklist.
It is rarely all those. People are garden variety jugglers, and the GPA are not 0.1 different. And frankly, if my kid wants to go see a juggling show he will buy a ticket and go to the circus.
We live in Florida which is the King of testing. Last year they were the only State to require Test Scores. My S21 is a Freshman at FSU, but I am a fan of Holistic review and here is why:
Not all grades are the same, Rigor counts. Not all volunteer hours are the same. Not all Clubs are the same.
4.0 GPA in Standard classes vs 3.75 in Advance/AP/IB/AICE/DE classes unweighted.
Volunteer hours that align to your intended major or that show leadership or mentoring compared to say picking up trash on the beach.
Some clubs are let’s just say social clubs while others are helping students or the community.
Some kids had to work to help support their family or care for a sick relative or other burden a typical high school student shouldn’t carry.
A Holistic Approach allows the AO to look and all this and take it into consideration vs Test score and GPA or at some schools just core GPA.
I believe the Holistic approach helped him with merit, we applied test optional OOS and got higher merit at most schools than publish on websites except one.
Your post talks about Ivys but these EC may move the needle at a state Flagship or give your kids the acceptance over similar stat kids with minimum EC
Let me acknowledge that as reasonable, but make a separate point (I am looking over my shoulder for the mods to come for me now). We should not encourage the kids to discount grades and hard skills to prefer a bunch of ECs etc, because 4 years hence, when they are interviewing for jobs (or even internships in between), indeed those grades and hard skills are often more important. To the extent soft skills are important, it is often things like communication etc. Not juggling or singing or a host of other things that may have helped at the college admissions stage. Kids should realize that they have to pay attention to grades more than they may have at the stage of entry. Among other things, grades show work ethic. Many good companies often have 3.8 or 3.9 thresholds to even call you for an interview. They also look at the rigor of your degree.
Never heard of someone getting into a school he wasn’t academically qualified for because of Juggling. Singing in a Fine Arts program could be considered more important than a SAT score or a Art Portfolio as well in a Fine Art Program.
To base your argument against Holistic reviews on an outlier such as Juggling or singing or some “other thing” doesn’t sound reasonable.
Schools do this already. If they tell you admissions are Need Aware they are taking your ability to pay into the decision process.
Yes - i’m just noting holistic means - in many ways subjective. You have other schools that admit based on a table, etc.
Holistic can mean so many things - from essays to LORs to ECs to you have money to your uncle is the Dean of Admission to your parents went here to we don’t have enough kids from Idaho to so many subjective things.
The highest paid entry level jobs out of college have much higher GPA thresholds than 3.0. Nobody advertises these things. Kids with low GPAs are just not called for an interview. Many of us have been on the other side of that interview.
If someone is applying for a Fine Arts program, then singing is not an extra curricular. It is the main activity. We are talking about singing as an EC for a candidate just as an enrichment where the candidate is applying for some other major, such as, say, biology or international relations. Otherwise we wouldn’t use the “holistic” tag with singing. Please read the response in context.
If we are actually talking about Ivys, although this may not be across the board, most kids with spectacular ECs have identical grades and scores to others. Especially kids with fine and performing arts high level ECs they also have 4.0s and high level gpas. The rare kid who doesnt is the one who has performed on broadway or is a reality show star (and I have been led to believe that those kids have the same grades). So these kids arent getting by on holistic review they are doing more. My S who I referenced above did not get into an Ivy, he got into a T50 and was rejected from T10s).
This. I am fine that highly selective universities look beyond GPA and test scores but I’d love to have a bit more predictability (including knowing if my child is not competitive) so that it’s not a total stab in the dark.
Having said that, I recently had a conversation with a couple of HYP alumni interviewers (both interview for the same school) and they both said that although applications have gone way up, the pool of truly competitive candidates hasn’t changed that much. If this is true, it would be helpful if schools convey this to us with greater precision than what I’ve come across.
I’d love to see an admission-equivalent of an NPC, even if it is just a rough estimate.
Your point that Holistic = Subjective - I agree- see 26 factors UMD uses. Some are out of a student’s control. Some students may score low but one does not know year to year.
Would be helpful if holistic admissions were more transparent.
Don’t most of these schools want more uncertainty, rather than less, so more applicants think they have a shot and will apply? Fluid admission criteria also give the schools maximum flexibility. Besides, they don’t want anyone else to second-guess their decisions and holistic admissions serve that purpose very well.
If schools continue to be rewarded, in rankings, for rejecting a large percentage of applicants, then they benefit from the perception of holistic review (whether they actually use it or not). To end this trajectory of more and more applications, there needs to be less emphasis on the “denominator” (total apps received). Experts, magazines, and colleges themselves should focus on a different measurement of excellence, selectivity, or even of exclusivity if that’s what they want to demonstrate. Tell us you’re exclusive (if that’s important to you) by showing us the high caliber students who don’t make the cut, rather than the masses of unqualified students you enticed to apply. Could be percent accepted/rejected with >3.8 GPA or something like that. Doesn’t prevent a school from taking students with lower GPA (to fill institutional need). Of course this begs the question of why a school wants to look exclusive in the first place. My guess is scarcity economics (desirability) plus the idea that it’s a signifier of rigor and quality.
I get that holistic is upsetting and disturbing to many.
But honestly- don’t you all remember the thrill of college? (or at least for some of us it was thrilling). The guy next to you in Econ who was able to share his notes which explained all the hard stuff in an easy-to-understand way- and then casually said “I’m performing this weekend, want to come?” and it turns out he was a hilarious stand-up comic in addition to a brainiac and great teacher? The woman next to you in Art History who invited you to join her that weekend on the “midnight run” she had organized to deliver sandwiches and blankets to the homeless? Your own roommate- who was a talented dancer even though she was pre-med and “only” had time to practice two hours a day with the campus ballet troupe, unlike HS where she was homeschooled to give herself time to dance with a professional company?
I cannot imagine college where everyone spends every waking moment by themselves studying or looking at a computer screen… and yes, I get it, that was Covid and online learning and lockdown. But those who think Holistic is some scam to deny your kid a seat at your favorite college- if it weren’t holistic, you wouldn’t want your kid there. You might as well get an online degree from SNHU and spare yourself the aggravation of moving into a dorm on the hottest day of August.
And yes, Oxford still manages to enroll dancers and fencers and comedians and musicians even though they “rack and stack”. So apply to a U overseas? We are a huge and diverse country compared with the UK. They developed their system- which has its benefits and flaws- and we developed ours.
Many kids who get high test scores did not go to prep classes and only took the test once and many kids who take prep classes / get tutored etc still do not get super high scores. Does test prep tutoring help sure it does but it does not always equate to scores in the 99th percentile. ECs are heavily correlated with SES - maybe even more so than testing - it’s kids with $ and connections who go to good schools in good areas that are doing published research, targeted internships and competitive travel sports, etc. Those kids usually have involved parents. Parents all think their kids are special, unique, etc (and of course that’s true) but on paper many kids are similar. Holistic review allows schools to put kids into buckets - you’ve got your athletes, band kids, robotics kids, MT, fine arts, etc. They also have buckets for gender, race, SES (how much can you pay), geographic diversity, etc. Fit can mean a lot of different things and the results are often unpredictable and blurry.
Can completely relate to this. Especially on testing. I couldn’t get either of my kids to prep even on their own (as in take one practice test the night before), let alone sending them to some class. Not that I want to spend the money. They did ok.
No, quite the opposite! I would love to have options here in the United States of excellent universities, at dirt cheap prices, that do not worship at the altar of sports, where kids don’t have to pretend to be CEO of a nonprofit that performs juggling for inner city kids. My kid would thrive in a Dutch or German style university. And I don’t believe that kids there are boring either; classmates will still be stand up comedians, they just won’t list it on their university applications. And “So apply to U overseas” reminds me a bit of “So go back to your country if you don’t like it.” Besides, it is not realistic for 99% of students. American universities have gone off track, and I say this as a parent to a kid who is a “winner” in the holistic games.