<p>This whole thing has become a circus and I blame the schools for it from their relentless fight to move up in the ratings. Use of the common application its the biggest culprit. </p>
<p>What end is really achieved in stimulating the growth of an applicant pool through the common application, when you are not then going to then take the time to really assess the fit of the student with the school through interviews, essays and SAT II exams? Washington U and Notre Dame, (since there is a need to pick on some guilty parties here), have just become application harlots. How serious can these schools be in evaluating their applicant pools when there are no evaluative interviews or SAT II exams involved in their admission processes? All they want are larger numbers.</p>