What if kids were limited to 6 applications?

Parents Forum
401

<p>The French use a variation of the medical residency match system or admission to a number of their top engineering schools.</p>

<p>Each student provides a ranked list of the schools he/she wishes to attend. I don’t believe there is a limit.
Then applicants are ranked based on results from a common entrance examination.
Based on your rank you get assigned to your highest ranked school with spots still available.</p>

<p>Oxford and Cambridge use a still different system to allocate students among the dozens of college that constitute each university. (Each admits yearly about as many undergrads as HYP combined)</p>

<p>You can either pick a first choice or leave your choice blank in which a computer assigns you to a college. If you are not selected by your first choice, you get put back in a common pool from which all the colleges can tap.</p>

<p>These types of systems can work fairly well when the types of colleges are part of a common system and cost and financial aid is similar across schools. </p>

<p>Some variation of these systems could be implemented for the UCs for instance. There is already a common UC app. There would only be one offer of admission for a particular candidate: from his highest ranked school for which he qualifies. </p>

<p>Why not also the Ivy League, NESCAC, the Patriot League? They all use the Common App. Just provide an ordered ranking. Same thing with the colleges with all the applicants.</p>

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<p>Heh, heh, try to convince any of the other universities in the Ivy League that Harvard is <em>clearly</em> ranked first. In England, a student can apply to Oxford or to Cambridge, but not to both.</p>

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<p>A couple of things about the medical residency match system:</p>

<ol>
<li><p>The number of accredited residency programs is a fraction of the number of accredited colleges.</p></li>
<li><p>A match system would not work at all unless costs and financial aid were standardized, or made transparent, neither of which is about to happen.</p></li>
<li><p>The match algorithm really puts most of the power in the hands of the hospitals. They only way a student can assure him- or herself of not matching with a low choice is not to rank that choice at all. My sister was matched with her last choice, despite the fact that her first choice had ranked her in the top 10% of all the candidates it ranked, because the last choice had ranked her a little higher. (It was her own fault; she knew that if she left that hospital on the list she was running a risk. But she was still pretty miserable about it. Several times over. At first, she thought her top choice had dinged her. And then later she learned through back channels what exactly had happened, and it made her feel worse, not better.)</p></li>
</ol>

404

<p>I am bemused that some would wish the colleges to be " the deciders", :wink: after being given the " only relevant information" like GPA & scores.
I mean really what else do they need? :rolleyes:</p>

<p>Sure some colleges do go that way- others have opted to take applications: with interviews, essays, visits and resumes into account, it makes for a more interesting class.
An adult student ( or soon to be) who has been shaped by their 18 or so years of living in the world- but doesn’t have enough of an opinion about where they want to spend four or so years of tuition money?
Please.
I understand that for those interested in scarce and competitive slots for performing arts schools may very well need to submit twenty or more applications.
But for your " average" CC student, it isn’t that difficult to develop weighted criteria for what interests you, identify the schools that offer the best match to that criteria in varying levels of acceptance rates & apply to them.
Of course if you have five or so schools that meet your criteria and accept you, you may have to go back over your criteria and reweight the qualities that are of greatest importance.
Aid for example, or plush dorms.
But even if you are planning to attend MIT, it really isn’t rocket science to figure out what you want.
If a student really has no clue as to where they would best thrive, then perhaps they aren’t ready for this step and would make more use of their time by living in the world- by working full time or travel, until they get a clearer sense of who they are.</p>

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<p>^what emerald said, yes.</p>

406

<p>JHS, was your sister’s experience before 1996? The algorithm was changed to favor students after that.</p>

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<p>Ref: [Some</a> of AMSA’s Larger Contributions](<a href=“http://www.amsa.org/about/contributions.cfm]Some”>http://www.amsa.org/about/contributions.cfm)</p>

<p>About your other points, yes, there are far more college spots to be filled and far more applicants applying, but computing power has increased exponentially in the last few decades so I really doubt that it would be too complicated for a few good computers.</p>

<p>The financial aid issue is valid, but mathematicians, game theorists and economists have developed some solutions to take care of financial conditions. I don’t think these are unsurmountable obstacles. For example, you could have a system whereby the applicant agrees to attend NYU but only if the financial aid package is above a certain threshold. Then, when NYU lists the applicant, they would have to specify their financial aid offer, and the match would only occur if the aid conditions were met. It would take away the all-too common situation where a student is admitted to NYU but finds out the aid package is not good enough to make it affordable.</p>

<p>The link below to a rather old paper makes some references to the ‘auction’ system:</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.siam.org/pdf/news/305.pdf[/url]”>http://www.siam.org/pdf/news/305.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

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<p>So, theoretically, one might put in criteria as follows: “I’ll accept Harvard even if they grant me no aid, but I’ll only accept Vanderbilt if they give me $10,000”?</p>

408

<p>^^ Correct, if that is how the parameters of the matching program were designed. You could probably make it even more detailed by allowing participants to specify the proportion of scholarships, work-study jobs, and loans.</p>

<p>I’m envisioning a web-based drop-down interface, similar to the one Collegeboard has in the score-choice era. You can tell them to send different combinations of your scores to different colleges. </p>

<p>Don’t expect this to be in place for your kids, though. Perhaps for the grandkids.</p>

409

<p>And colleges could still specify where they personally weigh factors (for example, college A could say that GPA gets a 50% weight and college B could say that it gets a 20% weight), right? </p>

<p>The million dollar question is the “special factors” - legacy, URM, athlete, development.</p>

410

<p>While I understand the desire to cut down the chaos and the uncertainty of the process I’m having a real hard time “seeing” the bottom line benefit to the students in the various proposals being put forth. So for the bid system being discussed some time in the fall of their senior year kids would need to strictly rank order their college choices … before almost a 1/2 year of growth and maturing they currently are required to make a final decision … and either without college visits or requiring visits to all possible schools that might be visited … and for the parents with 1/2 year less info about their financial situation before they rank order them … and this a good thing for the kids and their families. </p>

<p>I’m not buying any system that removes choices (limit of 6) … or that cuts offs options earlier (bid system). The current admissions system is only complex and/or overwhwlming for a very small % of students. (Understanding and applying for financial aid is another story … that system should be reworked IMO).</p>

411

<p>Pizzagirl: Realize this- colleges don’t have to justify their criteria any more than students do. Everything gets weighed into a rank order list that colleges get to upload on to the matching website. The individual parameters (eg GPA, scores) would not be part of the matching algorithms. The matching is strictly according to rank order lists.</p>

<p>Developmental admits could simply be placed at the top of the rank list. URMs and legacies could just be given a boost in their rank order status.</p>

<p>Athletes might need to be recruited outside the match, but then they are outside the system even now.</p>

<p>3togo: The final rankings would be specified AFTER the usual college applications deadlines. For a match date of May 1st, you could allow people to submit their final rank order lists as late as March 1st, a full 2 months later than the current applications deadlines.</p>

412

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<p>Ah, got it. The college just releases that Joe is #1, Mary is #2, Sue is #3, not that Joe had 98 points, Mary 95 points, and Sue 89 points (and they are only accepting 85 points or more). Kind of like sorority rush when a legacy automatically goes to the top of the bid list :-).</p>

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<p>My hope would be that this sort of system would dispel some of the angst from admissions for the kids. There is a strong sense already that beyond a certain threshold of scores/grades/citizenry it is quite capricious at the top schools. Right now we have a situation where kids like Curmudgeon’s daughter have a big advantage in simply having a parent who is so astute and engaged – and able to help shepherd her through the maze. For the typical student with two stressed working parents, this just isn’t the case. Most seniors can barely manage to fill out the common application, let alone strategize and implement a plan of attack. I’d love to see that aspect go away. When the dust settles, I suspect kids would land at appropriate schools using such a system - and perhaps there might just be a bit less bitterness over the process.</p>

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<p>This is an intruiguing idea, because it makes the student decide in advance what they are willing to pay/how many loans or work study hrs they are willing to do for each school, and it can vary. The excel spread sheet would be categorized with those parametyers. So, for eg (totally making htis up b/c I dont recall which schools offer what)Student A lists Princeton as # 1, will pay annually no more than $10,000 out of pocket, take out no more than $3,500 in additional subsidized/unsubsidized student loans (those are now all becoming federally controlled and out of the private sector, right?) and will do work-study up to 20 hrs/wk. (I am a little unclear how the summer work option works-- someone else could perhaps help parse that into the equation please. Does that mean work for a professor during the summer, or get some paid job in their hometown?).</p>

<p>The student lists Penn as their second choice, but will pay no more than $8,000 OOP, will take up to $4000 in loans, willing to work 25 hrs of work study, etc. </p>

<p>In truth, for those who really need to look at the finances, these kinds of thoughts are what go on after the acceptances, a they compare FA packages. "Am I willing to pay XXXX dollars to go to Princeton vs YYYYYY dollars to go to Penn, etc. Have the student think this thriough in advance. Great idea.</p>

<p>I understand there is some overlap between “out of pocket” and “loan” – but essentially the question is, what is the student willing to pay up front or later, to attend any given school. It doesnt mean the student will automatically pay the top amount they are willling to pay-- it just says that is their upper limit. In the above case, the student might get paired with Penn, but only have to pay $5,000 OOP.</p>

<p>While this may look like it takes away some of the " freedom of choice" from the student, which was a complaint raised by some posters who disagreed with a cap, in reality it merely moves the choice to the front end (decide up front) from the back end (decide after the acceptances and offers are in). I like it, though it is, IMO, more nervewracking.</p>

<p>The analogy to med/prefessional school internships breaks down b/c the internship sites pay the student rather than the other way around.</p>

415

<p>I agree that the process is Byzantine, arcane, convoluted and unfair. However, that seems a good description of most things in our society.</p>

<p>Who you know is always a factor and the savvy of those directing you is also always an issue.</p>

<p>Not saying its right, just the nature of the beast.</p>

416

<p>Okay, so if there are no more objections, shall we move on to implementation? </p>

<p>Who wants to write up the memo and inform HYPS that they have to adopt this system by 2012?</p>

<p>:)</p>

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<p>I will help! Mine will be in the awful process also for class of 2012. Ugh! Still recovering from her older brother’s ordeal. He ended up at a great school but we were worried, confused, paranoid throughout.</p>

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<p>So, how would this system work. </p>

<p>Schools don’t get applications all at once. They get them every day for months. </p>

<p>So now while we have a seperation of financial aid offices and admission offices, the idea here would be to meld the too. That the dollar amount a student is willing to pay would be as important as the students application?</p>

<p>Why do an essay then? Why take into consideration the school, area, etc a student comes fom, because seems it would be all about the benjamins.</p>

419

<p>As a very low income single parent, I would vehemntly be opposed to the 6 school rule. DD had a list of 14, almost ALL need blind, need based schools. The exception was the State flagship U, which given her stats, would have given substantial merit aid.</p>

<p>Taking the State U out of the picture, D needed to cast such a huge net to ensure going to college. This brings me to the never ending subject of “fit.” Luckily, my D was a Questbridge Match to her #1 school, with a full FA no loan package. </p>

<p>That being said, D was greatful and willing to go to ANY school that would take her, given our financial circumstances. She needed to apply to all 14 of those to ensure that she was going to school. When you are poor, “fit” goes out the window. Kids who have focus ,and are poor, will “fit” in wherever they go. My D was prepared to do this, but she was fortunate to get her #1.</p>

<p>Student’s like my D cannot be held to 6 schools. D had two choices, full need met, or State U. </p>

<p>There were no match schools here, only reaches and one safety. To take away the number of schools that she could have applied to would have been unfair.</p>

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<p>GAMOM: I am so happy things worked out so well for your family.</p>