Interested in your thoughts: Applied to a "need blind" school, but on the Common App they asked if

From many accounts, being full pay can indeed give you a boost. Not sure how much, but it can help. Here’s a question if you are deferred from a school that you applied to ED and are put in the RD round, does being full pay help based on what Sue22 said above? Thanks

Given the decreasing level of trust in society, particularly of formerly respected people and institutions, it is any surprise that, with respect to colleges with admissions processes that are opaque to outsiders (and therefore easily seen as corrupt, even if they are not), many people are unwilling to trust colleges’ statements regarding aspects of their admission process? And a few colleges getting caught cheating or fibbing can cause those same people to apply mistrust to all colleges.

Much of the boost that applicants from wealthy families enjoy is acquired before the college application process. For example, parents who can move to an area with better public schools or pay for better private schools, parents who can pay for additional academic and extracurricular enrichment activities, parents who can pay for any services needed to handle learning disabilities or spectrum issues, parents who can pay for expensive sports to help those with athletic talent get to the recruitable level, parents who can afford enough for college so that the applicant is not constrained by cost in choosing colleges, and is not limited in applying ED.

Of course, colleges themselves can crock their admissions processes to favor such applicants without looking at whether the applicant applies for financial aid. See reply #8 for how they can do that (but also add increased use of ED).

Ucb, this shouldn’t be about general society causes of distrust. That doesn’t make the fears real. And when talking about top colleges, it’s not even the sort of thinking they look for, in the first place. Assuming the worst is common…but not critical thinking. Will not help you with an admit, if you can’t figure out what they want and just go about thinking it’s all corrupt.

And btw, wealthy kids are no better thinkers than less privileged. Their apps are not guaranteed better. They still fall into the same old potholes. And no, being shifted by a Need Blind to the RD round does not mean the college is suddenly not Need Blind.

There are people (intelligent people, with college degrees and professional jobs) who don’t believe that babies and children can die of measles, or that an oral contraceptive is statistically more effective than taking a woman’s temperature and proceeding accordingly. These seem to be more serious overall than whether someone “believes” that a need blind college is in fact- need blind.

You don’t believe that they are need blind? Fine, go ye forth. I am happy to provide you with a list of hundreds of colleges where it truly doesn’t matter- y’know why? Because you aren’t getting your need met ANYWAY since the colleges don’t have enough money to fund your need (and they say so up front).

You just can’t control for what people trust and believe anymore. I have a neighbor- young mom- who thinks everyone was healthier “back in the 1880’s” before people poisoned themselves with vaccines and antibiotics.(and sanitation). I’ve pointed out that since the average life span was about 50 years old and MANY women died in childbirth, and many more babies died in infancy, calculating the relative health of those who survived is a spurious exercise at best.

But folks gonna believe what they believe.

MODERATOR’S NOTE:
Let’s focus on the original question please. This thread is circling the drain as it is with debate, so let’s not get sidetracked with ED/RD admissions or vaccination conspiracies. Several posts deleted.

@citimama9 – the direct full pay “boost” would be at a need-aware college.

Of course, there is an indirect boost simply as a result of coming from a more financially secure background, and all the benefits that are accrued along the way. Things like parents who can pay for private schools or private tutoring, participation in costly EC’s, or the benefits of being raised in a home with college-educated parents. But those factors aren’t directly tied to current level of need.

So colleges value applicant qualities that statistically tend to correlate with higher wealth.

I do think that my kids benefitted from those types of policies. We definitely needed aid – even at in-state publics – in part because of the impact of divorce. My son was an NM finalist, from a public school where no one was expected to do that well on the PSAT --so his qualifying score was from his first sitting for the test in 11th grade, with absolutely no prep. The NM qualifying system is inherently biased toward wealth. (See https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/03/05/these-four-charts-show-how-the-sat-favors-the-rich-educated-families/)

Even though money was tight in our family, I always prioritized experiences over things – so I paid for dance studio fees for my daughter for many years, and financed educational travel abroad for her during high school. So those were two very strong EC’s on her record that would have been financially out of reach for many.

Do I think that the colleges looked at their apps and thought “NM Finalist? must be rich!” or “travel abroad? must be full-pay!” - absolutely not. But my point is that they favor those qualities in college admission decisions. They don’t favor them because they are tied to wealth, but rather because they perceive them as good qualities for students to have. And that in itself creates an implicit, wealth-favoring bias throughout the system. (I am using the term “wealth” broadly here).

Where will your kids get with that hint blossom is gullible? Respectfully asked.

She’s done a lot of her due diligence. Anyone can. Many of us see that when a confused kid pm’s. With just a general point in the right direction, some of these kids have that light bulb go on over their heads. It had never occured to them before, to dig in. They genuinely thought it was as simple as high school stratification. Stats. Big Man on (the hs) Campus. Founded a club. And more.

Then there are the doubter kids. The ones who repeatedly ask the same questions, who don’t even get why they need to see what the colleges say and show. “But I’m top 5%.”

People can believe whatever they wish. But it won’t get them closer to an admit. I often think of what the Wizard of Oz said to Dorothy: You always had the power…" Top performers have the power (option) to do their due diligence. Naysaying isn’t what it takes.

Admissions (as opposed to Financial Aid) must assign the likelihood of accepting admission for each applicant (to know how many acceptances to grant). For a given school, the likelihood can be different for full-pay vs. financial aid.

Middlebury claims to be need blind. More than 40% of students are legacy. Is this need blind?

Just to be clear, I think Need Blind is a fib, and Need Aware ( specifically, only look if you need aid at the margins ) is a lie. Read the article “Some colleges have more students from the top 1 percent than the bottom 60%” it will help family’s like us, exactly middle class with a brilliant student, help them go about a realistic plan on creating a balanced list of schools to apply to.

The college can be need-blind for individual applicants, even though it is need-aware when planning admission policy for the entire class. A heavy legacy preference can help tip the class toward scions of wealth while still being need-blind for individual applicants.

Legacies can also need financial aid. There is no necessary connection between aid and legacy. 45% of Middlebury students receive full-need financial aid.

While true for individual applicants, legacy students all have at least one college educated parent, a correlate to higher income and wealth (and even more strongly for legacies of elite colleges), so the average financial aid need per student is expected to be lower for legacy than non-legacy students (especially at elite colleges).

You have to dig deeper than a headline, how many wealthy enroll, and your own assumptions.

Not all legacy families are wealthy donors. It’s not even balanced to keep saying you think it’s off or you looked up how many rich kids enrolled. Kids matriculate or not for various reasons.

Let’s not succumb to the urge to debate.

What’s the point here? Who cares whether the NB is not really NB but NA and whatnot. If you need FA, then check off the box that asks whether you’re applying for FA or not. Most do, don’t they? If you aren’t applying for FA, then leave the box alone. What else is there to do?

Not sure where @akqj10 got that ridiculous 40%+ figure. Among students who were admitted ED (which tends to be heavy on legacies) 10% were legacies. 11% were first generation.

You can believe anything you want, against all evidence other than unsupported conspiracy theories. If you think a college’s entire administration is composed of liars why would you be interested in applying or having your child do so?

@TiggerDad You wrote “who cares”. I asked this question, because some people like us could be full pay, but feel we might be eligible for something so we have to figure out whether it can be helpful or harmful to apply for FA.We are not mega wealthy. Some schools we filled out the FAFSA and CSS for and some we didn’t. I personally think when applying ED it helps if you don’t apply for aid.

@citymama9

On the one hand, you say, “I personally think when applying ED it helps if you don’t apply for aid,” then under the same breath you also say, “we have to figure out whether it can be helpful or harmful to apply for FA.”

The bottom line is, if your student is qualified for admission, then it doesn’t matter whether you check off the box or not. Colleges are more interested in filling the class with well qualified students than those who can merely afford the full COA. Most students, after all, do need FA and they do check off that box. If – and that’s a big if – there’s any advantage at all for leaving the box blank, that advantage will not make up for any deficiency in the application itself unless you’re willing to chip in a cool $2 million or more as a donation in addition. The point is not to hinge your student’s chances on whether you check off that box or not. If your student qualifies, then your student qualifies. If not, that box isn’t going to determine that.

@tigerdad I don’t necessarily agree. If a student is well qualified and doesn’t apply for aid I believe it can help. If a student is well qualified it can either hurt or not when applying for aid. I have seen with my D’s friends. Full pay kids are getting their ED schools and equally qualified kids who need a good amt of aid are getting deferred. I don’t know if this applies to my D since she would get very little aid if she did qualify. However, I have to wonder if checking the “applying for FA” box may have hurt her at her ED school since she seemed like a good candidate. Heck, even her guidance counselor told her she should be “getting good news” from them. It’s all irrelevant now though.