That was NOT because the AOs failed to double check, that was because the people whose job was to check the claims of the applicants were also in on the scheme. At any college that recruits athletes, a coach is the person who tells the AOs whether this student is indeed worth recruiting. Applicants were able to pass off fake athlete profiles because there were coaches who were paid to sign off on the fake profile. In other cases, there were admissions people who were in on the scheme. There were also SAT scores, but again, the failure was with the College Boardās proctoring process, not with the collegeās monitoring.
In the Varsity Blues scandal, the system didnāt fail to catch people lying on the applications, it failed because people in the system were paid to accept those lies. The gatekeepers didnāt fail to detect lies, they were paid to accept the lies as truth.
In fact, the Varsity Blues scandal proves that the process itself can work. If it was easy to slip by admissions by lying on applications, Singer would not have needed to bribe as many people as he did.
Iām pretty sure that AOs wonāt detect most minor exaggerations. Moreover, for applicants to āeliteā colleges, exaggeration are likely the rule, not the exception. These are, after all, teenagers who often feel that their own accomplishments are ānot good enoughā, especially if they come here or to Reddit too often, and compare themselves to the profiles there. However, these exaggerations likely have very little effect anyways. I do not think that AOs will prefer a kid who was the president of 4 clubs in their school over a kid who was āonlyā the president of two clubs. I also do not think that there is a difference between winning first place in a regional competition versus winning third place.
However, when an applicant claims a national or international level accomplishment (or the equivalent), that is when AOs start checking.
Moreover, for the vast majority of colleges that even consider ECs, it is enough that the applicant has a number of solid extracurricular activities.
Professors and administrators have been noting a problemāthese high achievers are great at reaching for the brass ring, but often not so great at finding direction when it isnāt externally provided. They may have trouble thinking for themselves, not because they lack the ability but because they have no practice. āEliteā universities do not want this. They absolutely do want passionate students. They may not have a foolproof way to identify them. But that is the goal. Of course talent is necessary, too. But there are more talented students than there are seats.
As others have said, context is everything. If your Dās activity tied with an illness from which she suffered, then most normal and well-adjusted human beings would be impressed and see it as the sincere and genuine expression that it is. Iād be impressed.
But there is plenty of reason for cynicism. Trust me. If youāre an AO and you see a non-profit started in high school and the home address is Medina, Washington, youāre going to want to dig further. OTOH, if all you care about are donations, then the Medina address is probably all you need to stamp āadmitā on the file.
I have a very wealthy HS friend who lives in LA, and heās starting this whole business of non-profits with his kids early. Too early in my view. Itās contrived. Itās entirely contrived. As our class Val, he wants his girls to have a shot at what he missed: Stanford.
Having had my older kids graduate from college, I see colleges as making them more so, of whatever they already were. Not something I realized before sending them. If your kid is already an intellectual, an elite school will make them more so, especially one where intellect is highly prized such as MIT (not where my children went). If they are quirky, and they choose a school where quirky is encouraged (however that is defined), they will become more quirky. If they are into having friends and a party and so on.
Starting to wonder if perhaps not the perfect place, but a place that has qualities that you would like them to develop but does meet their other needs might not be the best option.
@bgbg4us Very interesting. Did anyone look over his essays and ECs? Did he highlight and market this? This is always an interesting question. Given that he did have grades and scores, this is definitely a memorable activity. One of my has an interesting activity that they did in high school and it still comes up on job interviews (puts it into context as to how they got into their field). Had a friend whose student had really great legitimate ECs related to their chosen field. Spent every weekend coaching X, working with kids with special needs, raised $$$$ for a legitimate charity that they also worked for. Had decent but unspectacular grades but was not shooting for T30 schools. Very bad SATs that no amount of tutoring could improve (pre test optional). Barely got into an OOS school. The fabulous ECs really did not matter but I do not think they were highlighted properly and they had a paid advisor. So who knows. If your son is happy that is the best news
My final story dates back to 2016 or so. We went on a college tour. It was a small meeting room on an off day. Everyone went around introducing themselves and discussing their background. One student comes in and says from a prep school X in a major city which is well known. Their EC was that they have been traveling to Africa since middle school. They started fundraising for a girls school in the particular African country (a fairly modern and developed country so I am not sure why there was need for that but I have no idea). My student was flipping out figuring there was no way they could compete with that. I explained how that situation can work with parents helping out etc. PS, they were in the same freshman calc class!
A college friend of mine was the child of missionaries. The real deal. Grew up in a bunch of places you could not find on a map. Just such an interesting life story!
That was not this student, nothing in their background suggested they had ties to Africa and definitely not a missionary but I do not know them so who knows, perhaps there was a motivation that they presented in their essays. There may be less obvious reasons that are none of my business. Clearly the school was impressed enough to accept them
My D23 has a classmate like that. He and a few of his friends started a program in a Central American country (chosen because they had gone a great vacation there the previous year) and every year now they do a GoFundMe to raise money for them to travel there over summer vacation and run their program for local kids. Their parents are all quite wealthy and donate the vast majority of the funds that are ultimately raisedā¦So itās rich parents paying for yet another āvoluntourismā scheme under the guise of community-based fundraising and grassroots āhelping those less fortunate in the worldā. I really hope colleges see through this nonsense.
Similar situation with a classmate of my D. Kid created a non-profit that raised $10,000. Neglected to mention on college apps that the 10k was donated by one wealthy family - her parents. She didnāt see anything wrong with it.
The system is easily gamed by those with privilege.
My son rolled his eyes at a student at his HS with a nonprofit. It was clear to him that the kidās mom set it up to look good on college applications. If my son sees through this, I am sure college admissions boards see through this as well.
I agree - when a student is from a very affluent family, and is living in a very affluent area, collecting $10,000 is not all that impressive. Also, ācollected $10,000ā is meaningless. What did they do with that $10,000? Did they simply pass it on to another non-profit, or another such waste of time and money? Did they pay for a first class ticket to Kenya and for a fancy hotel in Nairobi, and hand the remaining $300 to the school that was closest to the hotel? Iām pretty sure that, by now, "I raised $10,000 for my non-profit to help starving kittens in New Fredonia"without any explanation as to why and how, is not going to impress AOs at any college with low acceptance rates.
Forget about red flags for AOs. Iām pretty sure that trying to use that $10,000 as a charitable deduction has a good chance to raise a red flag for the IRS.
The bigger problem is not the nonprofits, but the ābusiness venturesā, the proof of āentrepreneurshipā. Iāve seen businesses which were obviously the fatherās side hustle which were put in the kidās name to create the impression that this kid was able to set up a business worth $300,000 when the kid was a freshman in high school. Even legitimate ventures are easy when your parents and their friends and family can āinvestā $150,000 in your āstartupā, provide legal and logistic support, financial advice, and free or cheap office space and administrative support.
I think the tragedy is that we are perpetuating a system that encourages these behaviors. Now to be fair, it is only for a handful of schools but then again, at many ānearlyā elite schools, that need full pay kids, these types of activities work to an applicantās advantage.
I wish elite schools would use alum interviews to vet applicants in a meaningful way. Some do, some do not. But alumni interviews could be so much more!
Why do you think alumni interviews are effective? They can be very problematic, plenty of examples of that to be found. Just because someone graduated from a school doesnāt mean they have the skill to evaluate others and may bring a bias in that is not helpful to the goals of the institution.
Alums get training-- we donāt just get an excel with a bunch of names and contact information and are told āgo for itā. And just volunteering to interview doesnāt mean youāll get any namesā¦ there is a screening process.
Alumni interviews can be a very effective tool for screening applicants. Here is an example of what happens if this is done correctly:
Fast forward to around the 45 min mark. You can watch the whole doc if you like too. A bit dated but a good one. Anyway, see if you can see who blew it based on the interviews.
The point here is that alumni that are local and connected to the community and understand the ethos of their alma mater can provide unique insights into an applicantās resume and ECs.
Iām sure there are good alumni interviewers but there are also lots of bad ones. What process does the school use to determine who will be a good one? I was involved with a school that found them to not provide value added and sometimes to show bias against student populations they were interested in adding. I would propose that in most cases alumni interviews serve more of an advancement/alumni relations role than an admissions role.
My daughter interviewed at a number of schools and the best ones to help her decide where sheād be a good fit were either with a current student or an admissions staffer. The alumni ones were harder to schedule and did not provide much in the way of relevant student life discussion.
I interviewed for years and I cannot think of a single instance where my own personal bias against a āstudent populationā would have come up or have been relevant.
My job was to add to the picture provided by the application, recommendations, test scores, etc. Not to assert my own biasesā¦
Thatās the idea but not always how it works. And some people do have inherent bias without realizing it, not a nefarious thing. It can be seen in letters of recommendation too, particularly as gendered bias.
