Yes, that’s the way I read it too.
I don’t 100% know exactly what it was. No one ever does. I do know that no non-legacy has been accepted from his school since at least back to the early 90s, maybe longer. I do know that in his case, the other applicant was highly qualified, but that my son was the interviewer’s top choice. I do know that in a previous year a vastly underqualified legacy was accepted over an applicant who was qualified enough to get accepted everywhere else he applied including Chicago, Harvard and Yale. Most importantly. I know that my son had already made up his mind where he was going to attend prior to his Stanford rejection. He also passed on Stanford for graduate school. In the end, it was immaterial to him.
No doubt the algorithm, as decided on by humans, chooses what to value and those values may not resonate with all applicants or align with what other schools choose to prioritize. In the specific case of Cal Poly, it might not be considered “fair” because their algorithm awards points for non-academic things, attending a Hayden Partner School as one example. What is true though is that there is no human subjective interpretation of individual applications.
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The CPSLO MCA supposedly has “work experience is major-related” criterion. There could be some subjective interpretation of that.
A non-holistic process that assigns point values to various criteria could still have subjective judgement for some of the criteria, even if the applicants are not read and judged as wholes.
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Alas this no longer universally true. For the vast majority this does remain the case but demand for certain top or niche programs whose perceived prestige creates atmospheric demand, means that it no longer is. And they’re self-perpetuating. The higher the demand the harder to get admitted. The harder to get admitted the higher the perceived prestige. The higher the perceived prestige the higher the demand and round and round it goes. Want to do Engineering at Waterloo, U of T, McMaster, or Queen’s? Supplemental applications & EC’s (and video interviews) are required. CS at U of T or Waterloo? The same. Business at U of T, Western, & Queen’s? Ditto. Health Sciences at McMaster. Yup. Early guaranteed admission to 2nd entry programs (pharmacy, ophthalmology etc.) Yes. Any program at UBC? Yes. The race for med school admits seems to have really taken off recently as well. There are some other niche programs in addition to these that also use more than just grades for admission.
Having said that in the grand scheme of things those programs appeal to a small subset of all applicants and only certain students feel the need to throw their hats into the ring of selective admissions programs. In general I prefer our educational system. A standardized curriculum means no required standardized admissions tests and admission to university is primarily based on senior year grades. If you flounder in grade 12 you’re at a disadvantage but universities don’t care how you did in grades 9 or 10 and nor mostly how you did in grade 11 which is great for late bloomers. There is no middle school streaming. Streaming does happen in high school but Ontario is the last province that starts in grade 9 and they are transitioning to moving it to grade 11 starting this year. Having just gone through the application process with my 2nd and final child, I’m highly grateful that our system is the way it is (though it does make for a somewhat stressful senior year).
What I am starting to stress about though is if S19 decides to try for admission to highly selective US graduate programs.
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What I meant by safety, @ucbalumnus, is that as recently as 10 years ago, instate kids accepted at Ivy plus schools were not rejected by their local flagship, even in VA, CA, TX. Now it seems to happen regularly.
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Even 10 years ago, certain majors at certain state flagships were extremely popular and extremely selective, so that it was certainly possible for some students to get into a most selective private school but not that major at the state flagship.
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That interpretation is made by the applicant and not the school. It is not reviewed (We were told directly by the Director of Admissions that no human reads applications). It’s a check box on the application. Ditto EC leadership role. ECs are not listed, just hours, for better or worse. that means the national Key Club President gets the same algorithm points as HS Key Club Treasurer. A holistic school probably would not weigh those equally.
The bottom line is that no system is perfect. There is some subjectivity somewhere in almost every system either up front or in the reading process.
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Absolutely agree! I think it’s about the money because OOS pay full fare.
It’s not the fault of the schools if citizens or legislatures elect to underfund higher education by reducing taxes. Relying on OOS and International tuition is the only tool to keep their institutions thriving in that environment. Plus, most public schools are required to follow rules that regulate the percentage of students that come from their respective state.
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Princess Anne did not meet her offer for uni, I think Warwick, so did not go. I have no idea whether that is the general rule, but imagine that there might be an outcry if special provisions were made for them. GCSE and GCE exams are classified as public exams, so results are easily available to those who search.
I’m not saying it’s anyone’s fault, it’s reality. Some posters were noting that instate schools should prioritize instate applicants. They can do that provided they have sufficient instate funding (and as the law requires). When the coffers run low then alternative /additional funding streams become necessary.
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Also, and correct me if I’m wrong, that limited guarantee does not guarantee a student can take a specific major, does it?
No guarantees about majors are made, although changing major at UC Merced (even to CS and engineering majors) does not appear to be difficult: Changing Major or Declaring Minor | Bobcat Advising Center . However, UC Merced has a smaller number of majors than most other UC campuses.
There are too many applicants for too few places, and this drives the competition. It is, however, dubious that the public unis can apply the holistic approach properly. It is said that the AOs spend 2 min per application at UCLA. They will not get to know your kid, they will just check some boxes – leadership, special talent, relevant job, whatever. The kids and their parents try to guess what the boxes are and work to fulfill those requirements, sometimes against the child’s natural abilities, preferences, and wellbeing. This is not universal but it’s pretty common here.
The whole process fulfills some institutional priorities via social engineering but can be a lottery for a lot of unhooked kids. It seems less fair and predictable than the admission practices in other countries.
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There are only too many applicants for too few places at “elite”, highly selective schools. Most schools don’t have the luxury of of evaluating students on more than the basics and many colleges struggle to fill their classes. Even in CA, UC Merced accepted 88% of applicants with at least a 3.0 gpa; but l’ll guess that isn’t the UC most kids who were “shut out” wanted to attend. The seeming scarcity of seats at college is an illusion - there are plenty of spots at some very good, albeit lesser known and less competitive, colleges. Unfortunately, with the prestige mindset hard at work, students from affluent communities aren’t interested in them - they want a “name”.
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Do you have any evidence of this floundering, or is it just anecdotal, some vague claim? There’s actual data that shows kids from wealthier families graduating at higher rates, the ones that can afford the test prep in high school. Lot of these kids are self-motivated to do well in high school and on tests, and that carries over to college. You also have to figure out which of the floundering kids are in the rigorous curriculums, as that may be the real reason.
“Personally, I think you should only be allowed to take the exam once in junior and once in senior year, no superscore, and that all the test prep”
I agree that limiting would be a good thing, maybe just one try at the SAT and one at the ACT. But you can’t eliminate companies, test prep will still be there and the wealthier families will still use them but it would just be concentrated in a summer. Also many kids that take the test prep and do well on the SATs/ACTs only take them once. Here in the bay are kids typically study for SAT and PSAT in the summer before 11th grade, and kids qualifying for NMSF typically do really well on the SATs as well. Limiting is not going to hurt the higher SES students as much as other families.
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No, people don’t want a “name”. People want a solid education for their kids and good job prospects. This is why you try to squeeze into a good school district - the teachers are better, the students are more motivated, there are more choices of high quality classes. There are public elementary schools not far from where I live where grades are combined and the older kids teach the younger kids.
Same with college - as everything in the US from food to healthcare, the quality is uneven, there is a lot of marketing and you need to do your research to make sure you are not eating garbage.
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If this was true then awesome schools like Beloit College and Juniata would be more selective than they are. Too many parents conflate selectivity and quality. They might be related, but in my eyes, they frequently aren’t. How can sitting in a lecture with 600+ students with labs and discussions taught by TAs with a barely functional command of English be considered “high quality.” Yet, students beat down the doors for that DMV like experience based on name and a specious ranking.
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I don’t think the fetishism of elite colleges we see these days can be explained completely by a desire for better teaching, academically stronger classmates, and so on. After all, parents have always wanted a solid education and job prospects for their children. You would also be surprised at how little stratification there really is in student “academic ability” between institutions. I have taught students math at a “directional” state college, a top 50 or so state flagship, and (now) a top ranked liberal arts college, and, by the upper undergraduate level, find the students to be remarkably similar across institutions. What has changed is the relative cachet different institutions enjoy in the workforce. Increasing inequality - and fetishism of eliteness in the workforce - means that enhanced prestige produces greater marginal financial reward.
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