<p>...do you have to tell them? And is there any way they would be able to check?</p>
<p>It's not a big deal. Only I wonder how it affects your chances of admission.</p>
<p>I don't know how it affects your chances but it is optional.</p>
<p>I would not read into this. They probably just want an idea of who their competition is. If you file the FAFSA they will ultimately know anyway since a list of the schools you applied to will appear on it.</p>
<p>College like Rice (who does this) enjoy being able to say, "Our applicants often apply to other schools such as HYP, so we must be as good as HYP." or something to that effect.</p>
<p>I hate that schools can tell from the fafsa which other schools an applicant has applied to. I was told once that admissions and FA office keep seperate records, and that ea school only knows whether or not u are applying for aid.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Only I wonder how it affects your chances of admission.
[/quote]
You and the other dozens of people who have asked this. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>Usually when they ask that, they're looking for two things:
1) As janesmom said, with whom are they competing? Colleges keep track of this. For example, Boston College's biggest competitors are Georgetown, Harvard, Tufts, Boston U, Penn, Brown, Dartmouth, Cornell, Notre Dame, Duke, NYU, and Yale.</p>
<p>2) Is there cohesion in your list? In other words, are you really interested in that college and have done the appropriate research? An applicant applying to colleges all over the place with little in common raises a flag.</p>
<p>it is funny to note that while BC can say it "competes" with those schools, in reality, it is likely a safety school for most of the people applying to those other schools hehe.</p>
<p>Colleges are so insecure. It's not like we don't know they're businesses.</p>
<p>So in any case, I guess it's bad for me to be applying to seven competitive schools of similar character scattered all over the map, huh? I could leave it out in the application and just let them... find out... much to their dismay...</p>
<p>You don't have to put down every single school on your list. Just list a few. A college expects you to be applying to other schools. I have heard that you should put similar school types instead of being all over the place, but I really would not get too wound up about the question.</p>
<p>^that's what I did.
they don't need to know all the schools.</p>
<p>If they use that for admissions purposes, thats just wrong. People are forced by their parents to apply places, and apply just for kicks to other places, even though that may be a bad idea and just end up costing money.</p>
<p>actually you guys shouldnt put any schools down.. this came from my cc who was an adcom, its better not to put other schools down because a certain school may not accept you if they see that a better school may accept you or that if some other schools accept you then you will not go to their school, because they want an open seat for someone who will take it, you only should tell them when asked at an interview</p>
<p>that's why you put schools with similar selectivity. I dunno, i've heard arguments both ways. But both agree that if you do, but the same selectivity level colleges</p>
<p>yeah... but not putting anything when they ask seems a lot worse than only listing a couple.</p>
<p>When I was looking at apps, one college my parents really wanted me to apply to that I really did not want to attend asked where else I was applying. I was ready to list all my other colleges (very selective schools way out of this college's league) along with HYPSM, Williams, Amherst, and Swarthmore, while leaving out my safeties and matches. I wanted it to be more than obvious that I was using them as a safety so they could reject me and I wouldn't have to go.</p>
<p>I mean, there is no correct way to answer this question. If you list all your colleges, it may look like you are using this school as a safety or it has nothing in common with the rest of your list, or it is in the USNWR's top 10 like your other schools. If you list less selective schools, it shouldn't hurt. If you list nothing, they know you are lying because it is foolish to apply to once college (even if it is an EA/ED application). If you list more selective schools, they may think they are a safety, but if your stats are miles ahead of the middle 50%, they should be able to figure that out anyway. If you are upper middle class, some colleges may see you are applying to very selective schools that have limited (if any) merit aid, so the weaker college may see that they can get you by offering you lots of merit money.</p>
<p>It's honestly none of their business. They ought to decide whether to accept you or not based on the strength of your application, not what they might think they can infer from seeing where else you applied. Maybe it's innocent curiousity (in which case why don't they conduct a survey AFTER decisions are out?), but some schools are reputed to try to read things into it and reject you if they think you are using them as a safety (WUSTL & Tufts, for example).</p>
<p>So I think you are perfectly justified in giving them a list in your best interests. List an obvious safety, because everyone has one. The rest should be schools they see as competition, including one or two that students somewhat prefer over them so that they will figure they have to compete on the financial aid package.</p>
<p>I was told by an LSAT instructor, with regards to law school, that some school admissions deans talk to one another...so maybe (and im using arbitrary names) duke's dean is buddies with georgetown's...and duke asks georgetown if they intend to make an admissions offer....GT says yes, so duke doesn't bother knowing that between the 2, GT will get picked....so its only a negative if you actually wanted to go to duke...</p>
<p>don't know how true that is, but I was told it by an LSAT teacher that I was always impressed by....</p>