I am a sophomore (going to be a junior),when a college sends you letters does that mean anything? I’ve always wanted to know if that means I am a potential recruit for that college.
As a parent who has seen vast amounts of college recruiting mail come in, I’d say that this means very little regarding your chances of getting in or whether the College is a good fit for you. I’d suggest going out and visiting schools near you, even if you want a school that’s in a far away State. Get used to seeing schools and your preferences will become clear. Then you can select Colleges using those criteria.
They mean absolutely nothing. If you were a recruit, they would state it explicitly. The sheer volume of letters you’re probably getting should tell you that they don’t mean anything.
I wish they did. I’ve literally got about 50pounds or more in college mail.
tedders83:
what would be an example of colleges stating it explicitly?
I honestly don’t know, but if you have to ask that question about anything you received then it’s probably not recruitment. Recruitment generally refers exclusively to athletics. I believe the coaches at the various schools contact the student directly, but I’m not positive.
If you’re wondering about colleges that send you letters like “you seem like a promising applicant” or “you may qualify for our honors program” or “use our special ‘applicant’s advantage application’” or something along those lines, it’s not recruitment. They’re just trying to boost their number of applicants (in order to boost their ranking). They’re usually from schools you would consider “safety.” It’s not recruitment because they can still reject you or waitlist you if there’s a good reason. I got waitlisted by one of those schools that kept sending me things like that.
@tedders83 thank you 
It’s a very rough indication of your chances (emphasis on very) based on your SATs. I would hope Harvard wouldn’t waste money on postage by sending mail to students with a 1500/2400 SATs, however, I started getting mail from some very good schools once I passed the 700 mark on my individual SAT 1 and SAT subject tests. UChicago spammed the crap out of me and BU sent me some mail and yet I got rejected from both probably because of some of my junior year grades. I also had mail from John’s Hopkins and Wake Forest and didn’t bother with either. I believe that because I did poorly on my PSATs (long story, probably should’ve canceled my score because of it) I previously barely had any mail from colleges.
It’s advertising. However, it’s not necessarily bad. I got familiar with a lot of great schools I had never heard of because of it.
@iborpastan what schools did you get accepted to and what school are you enrolling in?
It’s a rare day that my D doesn’t get college mail! We get so much that we have a tray where we dump it, and when the pile starts to look like a Jenga game, I’ll open it and skim the contents. She’s a rising Senior now, and a few of the pieces have contained offers to waive application fees or even to fly her there for a visit. Moral: don’t just pitch it all.
Like everyone else has said, those letters are just indications that your standardized test scores are probably within the range where they will actually consider you. But you must also keep in mind that some of these colleges accept less than ten percent of their applicants when eighty to ninety percent have test scores and grades that make them eligible for consideration. I can personally attest that those letters mean absolutely nothing. I got those letters from every single Ivy, Caltech, MIT, Duke, Johns Hopkins, etc., and some of the schools that sent me those letters accepted me, some rejected me, and some waitlisted me. You truly won’t know until you get your admission decisions.
They may send a “likely” letter, usually AFTER they receive your application, around February/early March. In this letter, an admission officer will tell you he/she is going to recommend you for admission to the committee and check if you are still interested. Some schools, like Harvard, may also call around the same time (do not confuse a “likely” call with an alumni call for an interview). All other communications you receive, starting sometimes in your sophomore year, is basic “marketing”. My daughter received tens of email and letters by mail from very prestigious schools such as Columbia, University of Chicago, UPenn, Brown etc… She resisted applying to most of these schools, but “fell” for Columbia and UPenn, only to be denied, of course!
The people who said they are estimates of your stats are COMPLETELY wrong! They don’t take the time to sort through all that information. They get student information from various sources, then they send out everything to them. Because honestly they want more people to apply. The more people who apply the lower their acceptance rate will be, and in this modern society we live in, the lower the acceptance rate the “better” the college.
Zombie, I have to disagree. I have two boys who are classes of '12 and '13 so we have been consonantly bombarded by schools and their mailings. The younger one did very well on the SAT, several hundred points higher than his older brother and received mail from all the IVYs while his older brother received none of those letters/mailings. So there is some cutoff where they decide to send it or not and yes, it is designed to improve the number of applications, so they look more selective. Most of the time, he tossed it in the trash without even looking at it because school X didn’t have the program he was looking for…
Yeah, I’ve had the same experience as jandjdad. I got a 220 on my PSAT junior year, and after that received TONS of mail from colleges I didn’t even bother applying to because I knew my grades weren’t up to par. I received very few envelopes from schools I would consider “safeties”. UChicago and Yale were particularly persistent, but I didn’t delude myself into thinking that the mail meant I had a good shot.
@jandjdad it is a real theory. It happens all the time. One of your kids might have just signed up for more services than the other, therefore more of his info got out and the ivys got a hold of it. I really recommend you read The ***** Guide to getting into college and financial aid. It talks a lot more about this and it has some good tips.
Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using CC
Emails cost nothing to send, mail costs next to nothing. If a college spends a maximum of $5 enticing you to apply, saying you are a promising candidate, filling your head with dreams of stepping onto campus, and you apply, you have put $70 into the college’s pocket. And imagine if you attend! The college just made $250,000 off of a $5 investment in you.
No, the letters don’t mean anything. Colleges want to generate money from application fees.