<p>I haven't seen a thread on this yet, so I thought I'd post the link -- article by admissions officer regarding what they look for in applicants:</p>
<p>there are also other links to other articles in the issue about colleges, including their pick of 25 hottest schools.</p>
<p>Good article; thanks for posting it.</p>
<p>Great article by Bruce Poch - thanks for posting! Here is the link to Newsweek 2008 "hottest" college list:</p>
<p>For those too time-pressed to click, here's the gist.</p>
<p>"We've had to become personality detectives because so many students, like presidential candidates, seem to work under the management of handlers. Perhaps it's their parents who help to initially develop the college list. Then, a tutor works on test preparation while a consultant concocts the "perfect" extracurricular r</p>
<p>The way I read the article made me feel rather sad for students who attend large public schools with few and grossly overworked GCs, crowded classes with teachers who are equally overworked and are unable to provide the kind of recs that Bruce Poch thinks are so essential to show that the student is the real deal. The ones who attend schools with 1 GC for every 10 or 20 student, who have classes with a teacher: student ratio of 1:10 or 1:15 have an incredible edge (chances are their parents have the wherewithal to package them as well).</p>
<p>I liked Poch's essay, and I liked the "hot college" list, too. Not that I agree that those are the 25 hottest colleges, but I thought it did a great job of dramatizing how different colleges can serve different needs for different kids, and giving people ideas about what to look for when they are looking at colleges.</p>
<p>Marite raises a good point about the Poch essay, though. It jibes with my experience watching a few years' worth of kids I knew very well apply to college from a top private and a public magnet. The "flawless" public kids did just fine: they had plenty of support from faculty and administrators; everyone was on a mission to help them. Where the private school really excelled was with the slightly flawed candidates: packaging them and marketing them just so, with their strengths all shined up and their weaknesses admitted but played down. The private school also did a much better job of counselling students into LACs and other colleges a little off the beaten path -- 50% of the private school kids go to LACs, and less than 2% of the public school kids. It's not that the public-school GCs don't try -- if you look at where they sent their kids, it was Wesleyan, Oberlin, Wellesley, and Kenyon -- but they don't have enough time with the kids or know them well enough to break the kids' (and parents') big-school mentality. I will say that the public school is remarkably personal given its size and unavoidable bureaucracy. Not a single teacher or administrator there forgets that his or her job is to educate and to mentor specific, real kids, and no kid who asks for help is treated like a number or turned away. But the kids do have to ask for help.</p>
<p>The difference isn't night and day. Slightly flawed students at the public school who manage their relationships well can do as well as the private school kids, and the private school doesn't bat anything like 1.000 with its hard-to-pigeonhole types. But when I see a college, especially a top LAC, taking a risk on a kid, it's more often than not a private-school kid.</p>
<p>The admissions officers take into account the kind of schools that students come from when the admissions officers review the recommendations. Each students' application is viewed in the context of the students' resources.</p>
<p>That's why some students from very large public schools do get into top universities. That's also why the admissions officers from places like HPYS travel around the country to meet students and GCs at a variety of high schools.</p>
<p>A few years ago, I accompanied the Harvard regional admissions officer as she visited schools in my city one fall. I noticed that she took the time to personally talk to GCs about students who had applied early. When one GC said she had not spent a lot of time on the reccommendation because she had assumed it wasn't important, the admissions officer took the time to explain how H uses recommendations.</p>
<p>I also know that admissions officers will call some students' GCs and ask a variety of detailed questions. I imagine that if a GC really doesn't know a student, and admissions wants more info about the student, the admissions officer would call the teachers who recommended the students. The admissions officers also will call the alumni interviewers to find out more info about the students and their schools.</p>
<p>"Where the private school really excelled was with the slightly flawed candidates: packaging them and marketing them just so, with their strengths all shined up and their weaknesses admitted but played down. The private school also did a much better job of counselling students into LACs and other colleges a little off the beaten path -- 50% of the private school kids go to LACs, and less than 2% of the public school kids. "</p>
<p>From what I've seen locally, the majority of students at my local public schools -- some of which are highly rated -- want to go to in state public universities. Their idea of college is to be able to have football homecoming celebrations and similar things that one can get at large public universities like the one that's in my city.</p>
<p>The networking, homecomings, Greek life, etc. that one can get at large public universities really is what the students and their parents want out of the college experience. The small classes, etc. that exist at LACs aren't a draw for many students, even very bright ones who have college professor parents, where I live.</p>
<p>The overall message is positive because it tells students to be who they are, not who they think colleges want them to be. </p>
<p>Kids seem to think that they need to have ECs that are "not boring" or a certain number of community service hours, or something that is unique - a wow factor...all just for the purposes of admissions. It's reasuring if colleges do look at the whole set of data- grades, scores, ativities, interests, essays, as well as counselor and teacher recs, for consistency and a picture of a real human being rather than some ideal of perfection. When students choose how to spend their time based on their own interests and passions instead of based on what they think they "should" be doing, I think it shows. </p>
<p>Of course students in smaller schools can get to know teachers and counselors better (great for some students, not so much for others...), but kids from large high schools are attending competitive colleges as well, so they are somehow managing to get the attention of their teachers. Both of my kids went to public junior highshools that were huge and crowded, but we found that the teachers knew who the enagaged students were, and in some ways teachers appreciated these dedicated students even more, as they stood out because of their effort and achievement. At their private high schools, one had to be really amazing to be seen as excellent.</p>
<p>I applaud the efforts of admissions officers to look for authenticity...but maybe they shouldn't be advertising the fact; "authenticity" may become the next packaged product. ;)</p>
<p>There are a lot of interesting articles in that edition of Newsweek; thanks for sharing.</p>
<p>JHS:</p>
<p>Our school has a large number of GCs, especially for a public school. But GCs vary enormously in quality. Our GC sat down with us and S1 and discussed the meaning of reaches, matches and safeties, asked S what type of school he preferred to attend and drew up a list. She also talked about SAT scores, recs and the like. The results of S's applications were amazingly in conformity with the list of reaches, etc... A schoolmate of S1 had another GC. According to the mother, the GC told her D "I do not know you well enough" to make recommendations, though the girl had been in the school as long as S1. So the family were thrown back on their own research. Basically, the second GC saw her job mostly as gathering recs and transcripts rather than providing advice and information. Occasionally, I bump into S1's GC. He was in the top 10% but not a star. But she still remembers him, nearly ten years later.</p>
<p>Bruce's example, really tests his credibility if that is the best that he's got. Backing up Corey's educational trail, BA, PhD, JD, tenured professor, likely means that he applied to Pomona, what, in ~1990?</p>
<p>We experienced no school admissions department more anal, more driven by GPAs and SATs, more prestige conscious (sign of a clear inferiority complex), and, frankly, more obnoxious, than Pomona's. (The school is better than that.)</p>
<p>lol. Not our experience. Son found his interviewer down to earth and the teachers and admssions student helpers he met on the Admissions Day very approachable. I think after touring the east coast colleges, Pomona was a breath of fresh air.</p>
<p>Pomona does have an inferiority complex, but only because it is a generally underrated school. That is changing though.</p>
<p>I liked this article because it encourages kids to become themselves and understand themselves so they can explain who they are, something packaging can't really do for them. One of friends was critical of me because I encouraged my kids to keep stretching themselves, even when it was uncomfortable. Her position was that kids should NOT do EC's just for college. I insisted that it was not "just for college", but to develop into themselves. </p>
<p>From my experience, the article is accurate. Acceptances were most forthcoming at the best matches.</p>
<p>What admissions dean is ever gonna admit that applicants can outsmart them? Same day that a voter admits that he chose one presidential candidate because of the slick and polished image presented by that candidate. i.e. never gonna happen.</p>
<p>And I bet top colleges constantly reject excellent applicants who aren't savvy enough to "play the game."</p>
<p>JMHO.</p>
<p>Excellent point lskinner!</p>
<p>My kids went to a big, non-competitive public high school. They subscribed to exactly the approach advised by Poch--they were just themselves, unpackaged, with all their authentic peculiarities. Apparently, adcoms do have a clue, because, despite no "hook", they both ended up in very selective schools.</p>
<p>I think this is actually most helpful for kids like them, who don't know the packaging stuff and come from schools that don't. Their feeling was: this is who I am; if you don't like it, maybe I'm not right for your school. This way, we'll know one way or another. If you really are the type of kid the school wants, it doesn't matter what strategies the teachers or GC know--they just need to write the truth. How refreshing!</p>
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Excellent point lskinner!
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<p>Thank you!. By the way, I'm not saying that applicants shouldn't "be themselves." But they need to play the game too. </p>
<p>For example, if your passion is reading literature, it's not gonna be too impressive to colleges if you put down that you read a lot of books in your spare time. On the other hand, if you are president of the local book club, that will be a lot more impressive.</p>
<p>Basically, I think that applicants need to do the following:</p>
<p>(1) Find a couple activities you enjoy doing that won't turn off or frighten admissions officers. In my day, you needed to steer clear of Dungeons and Dragons, or at least not tell any colleges about it.</p>
<p>(2) Do those activities in an organized and documentable way. This shows the admissions officers that you are committed to the activity and aren't lying about what you've done. It's the difference between jogging in your spare time and joining the track team.</p>
<p>(3) Rise to a position of leadership in that activity. (Or at least to a position that sounds important.) This is critical. For all their talk of wanting a well-rounded class, what colleges really want are people who will succeed later in life and make big donations.</p>
<p>JMHO.</p>