Now That Decisions are Out, What Surprised You?

Parents Forum
101

<p>*"Having known several admissions officers personally who have worked at top/ivy schools, the nuance and the decisions are not something that can be completed by a temp or something similar and randomness. I could go into the details for years but I strongly disagree in this case.</p>

<p>I’ve been surprised generally but how much information some of the admissions officers (not all of course, but ivies, highly selectives mainly) know about research, predicting success in high school students, sat/act percentiles and scaling, socioeconomic variations by regions, demographics, nuances of high schools in their region (avg SAT’s, grade deflation, nuances of rank, which teachers write the greatest rec’s).</p>

<p>When parents, students and guidance counselors worry “oh princeton won’t understand my high school because of XYZ” in my experience they often know your high school better than the students who go there.</p>

<p>In my experience, I feel better knowing these people work in the admissions office and it’s not a “temp” just sifting through.
That said, at non-selective places, I think numbers do the trick and rightfully so."
*
Let me put aside for a moment that I strongly agree with those who have suggested that it literally cannot be possible for admissions officers to know, with anything approaching fairness, as much about the average/above average public school from East (or even West) Podunk that has no resources to reach out to admissions officers, and whose counselors, as Pizzagirl noted, spend nearly all of their time with the vast majority of their students who have no interest (or prospect) beyond their local public colleges, as they do about the tony prep schools or the high-income area publics that are true “college prep” schools.</p>

<p>The real issue is – so what if they did? My premise is that by applying simple objective criteria the top schools would still be left with many multiples of qualified applicants from which you could randomly select the admitted students and get the same result – a class of matriculants that is more than equal to the lofty standards and missions of those schools. Any top college worth a damn should be able to mold that practically
indistinguishable raw material into the same finished product. There would be hits and misses – just as there are now. But we’re already talking about the best of the best. Are Harvard or Stanford or MIT really so arrogant as to believe that they are not Universities for the top 1% of all US high school students, but in fact only for the top 1/100th of a percent, as defined by their own secret proprietary formulas and as can only be divined by their specially trained admissions officers? One certainly hopes not, and indeed if we are to take their public statements (not to mention their rejection letters) at their word, they freely admit that there is an overwhelming surfeit of highly qualified applicants. </p>

<p>Yet as a marketing gimmick, this idea that only the high priests in the admissions office can figure out who a “Harvard Man” is – well, it ain’t bad. There’s nothing special about a Gucci bag other than the name and the demand – but that’s what sets the price. And even viewed in fairer, non-economic terms, by building this fanciful mystique the top schools ensure an applicant pool that means they almost literally can’t miss. Which, of course, is why random selection would work just as well.</p>

<p>The human need that this myth of hyper-discriminatory selection of applicants by trained wizards satisfies is as obvious as the appeal of a Ferrari to the guy who only commutes to work with it in the same traffic jam as the schlub next to him in a Chevy Nova. Exclusivity! Everybody wants in to the club with the secret handshake and the robed guys who knock on your door at night to say that you are their kind of guy.</p>

<p>And so maybe the myth needs to propagate, notwithstanding it honestly makes no sense, because without it, going to “HYPMS” just wouldn’t be as attractive – and that would dilute the applicant pool, and that would make for more misses and fewer hits, whether those misses and hits are chosen by the inherently capricious human judgments of all too human admissions officers, or even by random selection.</p>

102

<p>Actually - how do you know that some colleges aren’t outsourcing their admissions decisions? I am aware of one fairly prestigious university that has done just that. They are generating thousands of applications by e-mailing seniors a “fast app” type thing in the fall - no app. fee - no essay. How do I know they are outsourcing? Well, I am aware of a student who received an acceptance in the fall. Then in March, he received a rejection letter. How could this happen? So, we called and spoke with our regional admissions rep, who was horrified, checked into it, blamed the mistake on the outside vendor, and told us that even though the deny was really the “correct” decision, they would honor the admit since we do have a good relationship with them.</p>

103

<p>^^ okay, now THAT is appalling.</p>

104

<p>i wish Syracuse would outsource. Son is one of a multitude of kids who have not heard one way or the other. Fortunately he’s in at a group of terrific schools, but i feel for the kids’ posts i’m reading where this is a REALLY big deal to them.</p>

105

<p>My D’s school has a bulletin board which lists all the acceptances each child received and whether a scholarship was awarded. When I went to parent/teacher night, you’re darn right I stood there and read the board. Mostly out of curiosity and general interest. As far as her closest friends, I can tell you what the bulletin board listed. I can’t even imagine how you’d not retain that information.</p>

<p>There are several of her friends, both in school and out of school, with whom D talked in great detail about their scores/grades/aspirations/results. In a bunch of cases, those conversations were held in my house and I was dragged in “what do you think of . . .” In her group of closest friends, I probably know most of that stuff because the kids told me in various ways at various times and, again, how do you not retain that information? It may be that in that group, no two applied to the same schools or shares the same interests, so they were never competing with each other that allowed them all to be so open.</p>

106

<p>I have no idea about the results of other kids (large public school, little discussion of outcomes). However, April 1 fell during break and kids were texting, calling and posting on facebook to close friends to commiserate. DS was rejected from his one Ivy so within minutes he found an old acceptance letter on the web, doctored it with his name and date etc and posted it on facebook. He texted his good news to two friends who were both EA acceptees to this Ivy. One girl is at his school and he promised that he would haunt her the next four years at the Ivy. The acceptance letter was an excellent fake and he called me in to see it and I fell for it hook, line and sinker…I whooped and couldn’t wait to boast although he had already decided where he will attend (not Ivy) but inside I was bursting with mom-pride (and surprise). He kindly let me down by saying april fool’s …Like I said, he had already decided so it wasn’t as cruel a joke as it sounds.</p>

<p>The fake accpetance on FB elicited the most hilarious responses…many kids realized it was a n April fool’s joke and begged for their own version (we had a number of Ivy rejects)…he happily complied…several kids played the same semi-cruel joke on parents…some kids congratulated him …a couple of nasty URM comments revealed some formerly unspoken biases and resentment…the Ivy EA student was also fooled and tried to put a positive spin on the news (she thought) that DS would be haunting the hallowed halls of her ivy dream school and teasing her for another 4 years…she took the joke in very good part and, as a fellow URM, was glad to know that she could point to my S (urm, rejected) and the other EA admit (zero-hooked, accepted) as counterexamples to the assumption that great test scores, hardest curriculum with good grades and hooked will guarantee admission and the unhooked stand no chance. DS has stayed quiet about all his other results but is happy to broadcast his rejection from Ivy in order to promote better relations between the hooked and unhooked.</p>

107

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<p>Same here. Son’s class of 65 has been together (most of them) since kindergarten. My son’s friends parents are also my friends. It’s one of the biggest advantages to being in a small private school setting- you really get to know the other families and kids and they all rally around each other in times of need and in times of celebration. There’s no way to get ‘lost in the crowd’ at a school like that.</p>

<p>It’s not for everyone but the parents at my son’s school generally love it. There’s no need to hide information from each other because the kids are incredibly supportive of one another as are the parents.</p>

<p>Personally, I find it a little weird that so many people profess not to know what their kid’s friends are doing. I love the fact that my son and his friends are willing to share information with their parents and their friends’ parents. I’ve had many a night this fall when I sat with a group of boys in my great room and discussed where everyone had applied. And now the talk has turned to where everyone is planning to attend. Everywhere I go, people at school and at work, ask where son is going to attend - many asked where he had applied. I don’t see anything wrong with that but it might be more of a southern thing. People here are usually genuinely interested in hearing about what you and your family are up to - even perfect strangers will ask.</p>

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<p>If they are perfect strangers, then how is it genuine? See, I personally don’t find that genuine. But I do just fine in the Northeast :-)</p>

<p>This reminds me of a thread on a message board I used to frequent, about how much your barista at Starbucks (if you frequented a Starbucks) knew about you. For some people, they told their barista everything – and for some of us, the conversation never went beyond pleasantries and the coffee order!</p>

109

<p>100 students in our class and most are fairly open. What surprised me was hearing several parents talking about double-depositing. I admit to doing it, but both schools told us our deposits were refundable before May 1st and I’ve already requested a return on the deposits. GC said 31 students applied to OSU and 20 to Miami Univ. All 20 were accepted at Miami, so we’re feeling the love :slight_smile: The trend is definitely towards the publics, a complete turnabout from five years ago.</p>

110

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<p>Well, I don’t think the two (being a stranger and being genuinely interested in someone) are mutually exclusive but I grew up in the NE and didn’t move to the south until college, so I can appreciate that it’s a cultural difference. It took me many years to get use to it.</p>

111

<p>I like this thread, so I thought I would BUMP it up.</p>