<p>I've been reading posts for quite a while, but now that I have a burning question, I'd like tap into your collective wisdom. </p>
<p>We live about 70 miles north of the SF bay, in a rural area. My S goes to a great public high school that has a wide mix of kids from all socioeconomic groups, and has mostly white and Hispanic kids. The school has been named a Distinguished California School 5 times. It offers a full range of AP classes, as well as vocational tracks. My S has taken a very rigorous curriculum, gotten very good grades, and gotten high SAT I and SAT II scores. He also has great ECs.</p>
<p>We've been looking at some East Coast schools where his SATs and GPA put him in the top of, or above, the middle 50% of applicants. He is very taken with one school in particular that accepts about 26% of its applicants. We visited the school itself, and then attended a SF group information session put on by the two admissions officers that split up the Bay Area.</p>
<p>Here is my concern: Neither officer knew who covered our county. I went online and looked up which one it was and sent him an email, I kept it light and humorous, just letting him know that it was indeed him. No answer. My S emailed him with a very specific question about an interdisciplinary major the school offers. No answer. Subsequently, my S emailed the school's admissions office and a current student with the same question, and received answers from both. What does it mean if your regional admissions officer won't give you the time of day? We noticed that most of the attendees at the group session in SF were from private prep schools. </p>
<p>Doesn't your regional admissions officer have the first crack at the applications from their assigned area? Is my S's application going to disappear because of an admissions officer who is either overwhelmed or unimpressed by my son's high school? Any insights?</p>
<p>Perhaps the regional person is on the road right now? This is the time of year for that and if his school is back east, perhaps he hasn’t gotten back there yet. How long did you wait for an answer?</p>
<p>Perhaps I’m being paranoid, its just that all the other school’s admissions officers for our area have been very attentive. The silence in this case is deafening, I guess we’ll just have to try again.</p>
<p>Thanks to both of you. He might well be very busy… or just bad at his job. I believe that at most colleges two admissions officers look at applications, so there’s hope.</p>
<p>bopambo: I’d say to not expend energy worrying about the officer’s seeming lack of attentiveness to your son’s query. You’re actually banking on his ability to read your son’s app and give it its due based on the context of his school. Who cares if he’s terrible at returning emails? Or has a messy car? Or doesn’t like relish on his hot dog? Does this mean he isn’t good at reading files deeply? I dunno. I don’t think so.</p>
<p>It is disconcerting to be at the mercy of this big machine which is selective college admissions, yes. But don’t let the window you’ve had with this one person shouldn’t color you too much. Good luck to you and your family</p>
<p>Like anything else, there are good ones and bad ones. Many are new as few stay in those jobs long. Most do what I did–spent 2 years before grad school.</p>
<p>What happens is they investigate the schools when the apps come in. Given your school has a lot of URMs, that may make it worth a harder look to the RR. But rest assured, he’ll have a problem if he only puts prep school candidates before the committee, so that won’t happen.</p>
<p>hmom5, I really needed that perspective, thanks! </p>
<p>This afternoon a friend handed me a copy of “The Gatekeepers: Inside the Admissions Process of a Premier College”.I haven’t been able to put it down, and I recommend it to everybody going through this. It just points out that admissions at selective schools have grown into a big stressful messy business, just like a lot of other human enterprises. I’ve chilled out.</p>
<p>Lol, while a good read, Gatekeepers is dated and has a limited perspective. The book to read is Golden’s Price of Admission, more recent, a broader perspective and really shows how the game is played today. He is a WSJ reporter and won a Pulitzer for this work.</p>
<p>Just for yucks I started looking at the stats of students rejected from colleges just to get a more realistic sense of how much of a lottery it is these days at the Top 30 (whatever number ) schools. Helps to put one’s student’s chances into perspective and , I hope not ironically, impels one to look at this process much more philosphically.</p>
<p>Kei</p>
<p>P.S. Gatekeepers was better than hmom5 said it was :-)</p>