Showing the Love - Applicant Level of Interest

Parent Cafe
1

<p>I have noticed on CC, as well as in our high performing Northeast suburban school district, that a lot of the top performing students (4.0+ GPA, 2100+ SAT, great EC's/leadership, usually a state or nat'l award winner) are being waitlisted or outright rejected at very good schools that, in the past, had been considered low reach and target schools for many of these type of students from our HS.</p>

<p>Most of these kids are still waiting for the March 30 - April 1 decisions and have been admitted somewhere, but there continues to be surprise about the waitlist and rejections.</p>

<p>When I asked the parents if they had visited the school or if their student had any specific communication with a professor, coach, EC advisor or admissions officer, they said "no." </p>

<p>As many on CC know, for all schools that complete the Common Data Set, in the "First Time, First Year Admissions" section there are a series of criteria that are listed as "Very Important", "Important", "Considered" and "Not Considered" .</p>

<p>For some of the schools viewed as targets/low reach by the GC's for very high performers in our district, I looked up the most recent data set...to see if "Level of Applicant Interest" (showing the love) was an admissions criteria:</p>

<p>Bates: Very Important
Bowdoin: Not Considered
Bucknell: Important
Carleton: Not Considered
Conn College: Considered
Emory: Important
GW: Considered
Hamilton: Considered
Macalester: Not Considered
Middlebury: Considered
Reed: Important
Skidmore: Considered
Vanderbilt: Not Considered
Wesleyan : Not Considered</p>

<p>Is the CDS completely honest for every school? Maybe not. </p>

<p>Could there have been issues with the student's essay, teacher or GC rec? Sure. </p>

<p>Or maybe they were waitlisted/rejected because the admissions commitee member woke up on the wrong side of the bed the day they read the app. </p>

<p>But, some advice for next year's applicants: None of these schools are safeties. However, for the type of student that thinks these schools might be a match or low reach, at the very least, they need to look at the factors on the CDS that are Very Important, Important and Considered, and make sure they have done whatever they can so that their application reflects some attention to each of these criteria.</p>

2

<p>My son showed Bates the love and they showed him the love back. He also interviewed at every school he applied to (except the ones which didn’t interview) and visited all but two. He applied to 9 schools and got accepted at all 9 -with every school giving him $$ except for Binghamton.</p>

3

<p>I think that demonstrated interest, as the admissions reps call it, is becoming increasingly important in the age of the common app and 15-20 applications per student. Just yesterday I heard of our neighbors’ son, a very bright kid and Eagle Scout with great stats, was accepted to one of the service academies (a huge honor and very selective) yet rejected at Lehigh, which was really a low match for this kid. He did not visit or “show the love,” though.</p>

<p>Incidentally, the common app was supposed to make things easier and open up opportunity. Ironically, it may end up contributing to an environment favoring those students who can afford to visit dozens of far-flung colleges prior to application.</p>

4

<p>We culled Tufts from D’s application list for a high match school due to the “show the love” issue. She wasn’t able to visit for various reasons, and we figured she would just get rejected. She kept CMU and Northwestern as her private college high matches, and she did ultimately receive acceptances from both although she had never visited either school.</p>

5

<p>I’m kinda sick with worry over this one – D’s list changed so dramatically – many of the schools we visited, she didn’t apply to, and many of the schools she applied to, she hadn’t visited. She got rejected from GW (so did another girl) probably for that reason (her stats were over what they accept; she has a solid track record of interest in politics and leadership). I think schools are getting better at sniffing out those kids who are applying as a back up. But honestly – if your child does a sport, it is very hard to carve out enough time to see each and every school unless you do all your trips in the summer, which doesn’t give you the sense of the student body and if you’d fit in. I think if you can’t visit, but if your essay shows a genuine appreciation of what the school is known for, and if you know some good friends who like it there and why, you can at least show you want to go there for a reason. That’s why I’m telling myself.</p>

6

<p>Don’t apply to a school that is so passive-aggressive as to require “demonstrated interest” for an automatic-admit. Jessh! Can you imagine the “love” requirements once enrolled?</p>

7

<p>American U. is known for taking demonstrated interest into account. </p>

<p>UVa insists they don’t track interest at all. A staffer wrote: “We never had a sign-in sheet for admission tours, until parents insisted they wanted something to sign.”</p>

<p>Usually top students get waitlisted, not rejected, if they haven’t shown enough interest.</p>

8

<p>Who is “American U”? UVa is a great school, known for their “numerical evaluation”, never a “show me the love” school.</p>

9

<p>“Showing the love” can be done in ways other than a visit…but should probably be done in more than the “why this college” essay…unless demonstrated interest is not important to the college.</p>

<p>Contact a professor in an area of interest (even better…tell the admissions office you’d like to talk with Professor X because of your interest in her research)</p>

<p>Ask the admissions office if they can put you in touch with a recent alum in your area so you can talk with them about the school, since you won’t be able to visit. </p>

<p>Ask the admissions office if they can help you make contact with the head of the Debate (or Social Action, or Model UN or whatever) Club, since you won’t be able to visit, but would like to find out more about the club.</p>

<p>Ask the admissions office how you might arrange to get a subscription to the campus newspaper.</p>

<p>ETC.</p>

10

<p>FWIW demonstrated interest comes in many forms. Brown cares quite a bit about it, but they don’t track things like campus visits - it’s supposed to come through in your essays. So keep that in mind, as well.</p>

11

<p>I think using interest in attending in admissions is an excellent idea! It’s a way to fight back against students who instead of applying to 3-4 colleges, or 5-6, are now applying to 10-12. Since they have so many well-qualified applicants, why not choose those who really want to be there?</p>

<p>In the case of American U., fewer than 40% of students major in the liberal arts. All those potential liberal arts applicants for the most part have no idea why they applied, except they thought it might be easy to get in. Well, now the news is - it’s not. They better have good reasons to want to be there - and be prepared to express it.</p>